THERE were powerful picket lines outside hospitals around the country yesterday as junior doctors began a 72-hour strike against Tory attacks on the NHS and the 30% ‘erosion’ of their pay under the Tories.
There is going to be a BMA rally and march of junior doctors to the Department of Health in Victoria tomorrow afternoon.
Rachel Hallam, BMA rep for Junior Doctors at Kings College Hospital in south east London, told News Line: ‘It’s an insult. We were offered a 5% pay increase which is less than half the rate of inflation, the same as what other sections of the NHS have been offered.
‘If we accept, we set a precedent for everyone else, and we know that we are worth more and so is everyone else. We want full pay restoration, that is why we are out again.’
Roselle Phelan, BMA member at Maudsley Hospital, opposite Kings, said: ‘As health care workers, our pay being cut just makes us feel less and less valued. We are acutely aware of how many people are leaving the NHS and how badly understaffed things are as a whole in the NHS. As junior doctors, we are pretty determined, and unified. Health care workers need to be valued.’
At the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel, BMA Rep Louise said: ‘We’re still going strong here. We’ve started a local campaign to join the forces of the doctors and the nurses and other healthcare workers. We’re just going to get stronger. We’re learning each time. Every time we picket more people come to support us.’
At Whittington hospital in North London, BMA Rep Frederika said: ‘We’re here again for the third time in less than a year. We are doing it for the NHS, we’re overstretched and we see patients suffering every day from the lack of staff.
‘As doctors we recognise our pay has been cut by over a third and we’ve seen the detrimental effect on our profession and the NHS. We never want to have to take strike action but we have no choice.’
Ken Muller from Islington NEU, said: ‘We are about to take further action ourselves. The government say our pay claims are not realistic and yet the wealth of the richest went up by £150 billion in recent years which could fund all the public sector. This government represents the bankers and the wealthiest in society.’
On the picket line at St Thomas’ Hospital at Westminster Bridge, junior doctor Louise told News Line: ‘We’re striking to protect the future of the NHS, which is in danger of collapsing from lack of doctor retention. We are overworked and underpaid, so people are leaving.’