{"id":605771,"date":"2025-12-01T18:28:22","date_gmt":"2025-12-01T18:28:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/605771\/"},"modified":"2025-12-01T18:28:22","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T18:28:22","slug":"doctors-to-stage-five-day-strike-before-christmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/605771\/","title":{"rendered":"Doctors to stage five-day strike before Christmas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nick TriggleHealth correspondent<\/p>\n

\"EPAEPA<\/p>\n

Resident doctors last walked out in November, demonstrating in Liverpool (pictured) as well as across England<\/p>\n

The British Medical Association has announced a fresh round of strikes in England in the long-running pay dispute.<\/p>\n

Resident doctors, the new name for junior doctors, will stage a five-day walkout from 17 December.<\/p>\n

This will be the 14th strike by the doctors’ union since March 2023 and is expected to cause significant disruption, particularly in hospitals.<\/p>\n

NHS bosses said it was an “inflammatory act” by the BMA as the lead up to Christmas was always challenging.<\/p>\n

But the union said it had been left with no choice because it had not received a credible offer from the government.<\/p>\n

Resident doctors represent nearly half the medical workforce and range from doctors fresh out of university through to those with up to a decade of experience.<\/p>\n

They will walk out of both emergency and routine care, with senior doctors brought in to provide cover.<\/p>\n

Daniel Elkeles, chief executive of NHS Providers, which represents hospitals, said: “This is an inflammatory act by the BMA.<\/p>\n

“Everyone knows in the run-up to Christmas we need all hands on deck.<\/p>\n

“It’s really important to be able to discharge as many patients as possible so that where appropriate they can be at home with their loved ones.<\/p>\n

“It’s totally unfair to patients and to other staff working for the NHS.<\/p>\n

“Both sides need to get back round the table to break the logjam.”<\/p>\n

The walkout follows a five-day strike held last month and that came after talks broke down between the government and union.<\/p>\n

The government had offered doctors a deal which involved creating more training posts, improving working conditions and helping them with out-of-pocket expenses such as exam fees.<\/p>\n

But the BMA turned that down, saying any deal needed to involve an increase in pay.<\/p>\n

\"Chart<\/p>\n

Health Secretary Wes Streeting has maintained he would not negotiate on pay after resident doctors had received pay rises totalling nearly 30% in the past three years.<\/p>\n

But the union argues that, despite the pay rises, resident doctors’ pay is still a fifth lower than it was in 2008, once inflation is taken into account.<\/p>\n

Dr Jack Fletcher, chairman of the BMA’s resident doctors committee, said as the government had failed to come forward with a credible plan the union had been left with no choice.<\/p>\n

But he added: “These [strikes] do not need to go ahead. Gradually raising pay over a few years and some common-sense fixes to the job security of our doctors are well within the reach of this government.”<\/p>\n

The BMA’s mandate for strike action ends in early January, but it has announced it will be holding another ballot of members.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nick TriggleHealth correspondent EPA Resident doctors last walked out in November, demonstrating in Liverpool (pictured) as well as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":605772,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13,12,14],"class_list":{"0":"post-605771","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-stories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115645732022518035","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605771","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=605771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605771\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/605772"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=605771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=605771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=605771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}