On Monday, tens of thousands of junior doctors in England are set to go on strike for three days due to a pay dispute. The strike follows a series of similar strikes by healthcare workers in the state-funded National Health Service (NHS) over pay and conditions. Thousands of protesters marched through London to the British prime minister’s residence on Saturday in support of the healthcare workers. The junior doctors, who are the backbone of hospital care, are expected to walk out across England for three days, which NHS England has warned will be even more disruptive than recent walkouts by nurses and ambulance staff. While the NHS has said it will prioritise resources to protect emergency and critical care, maternity care, and where possible, patients who have waited the longest for elective care and cancer surgery, thousands of appointments and procedures will be cancelled during the 72-hour strike.
The strikes are part of a wave of industrial action that has disrupted Britons’ lives for months as workers demand pay raises to keep pace with double-digit inflation. Teachers, train drivers, airport baggage handlers, border staff, driving examiners, bus drivers, and postal workers have all walked off their jobs to demand higher pay. Unions have argued that wages, especially in the public sector, have fallen in real terms over the past decade, and a cost-of-living crisis fuelled by sharply rising food and energy prices has left many struggling to pay their bills.
The UK’s annual inflation rate was 10.1 percent in January, down from a November peak of 11.1 percent but still a 40-year high. The Conservative government has argued that giving public sector staff pay increases of 10 percent or more would drive inflation even higher. However, there have been recent signs of progress towards ending the disputes. Nurses, midwives, physiotherapists, and ambulance staff last week called off planned strikes to hold pay negotiations with the government.
Health secretary Steve Barclay has said he would hold talks with junior doctors’ representatives if they agreed to call off their walkout. “Let’s have a constructive dialogue to make the NHS a better place to work and ensure we deliver the care patients need,” he wrote on Twitter. However, the doctors’ union, the British Medical Association, has said there have not been “any credible negotiations” and the strike will start as planned on Monday.
The strikes come as the NHS is facing increasing pressure due to rising demand for services and a shortage of staff. The NHS is also grappling with a backlog of patients waiting for treatment due to delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The strikes are expected to exacerbate these issues and put further strain on an already stretched healthcare system.
In conclusion, tens of thousands of junior doctors in England are set to go on strike for three days due to a pay dispute. The strikes follow a series of similar strikes by healthcare workers in the state-funded National Health Service (NHS) over pay and conditions. While the NHS has said it will prioritise resources to protect emergency and critical care, maternity care, and where possible, patients who have waited the longest for elective care and cancer surgery, thousands of appointments and procedures will be cancelled during the 72-hour strike. The strikes come as the NHS is facing increasing pressure due to rising demand for services and a shortage of staff.