JUNIOR DOCTORS in England will strike for five consecutive days in July, in what is thought to be the longest single period of industrial action in the history of the health service.
The British Medical Association (BMA) said the five-day walkout would be between 7am on Thursday 13 July and 7am on Tuesday 18 July.
Junior doctors’ pay has decreased by more than a quarter since 2008 when inflation is taken into account – and many are burnt out from an increasing workload, according to the BMA.
It said they had no option but to strike as the government had only made a 5% pay offer, way below the 35% they are demanding.
The government has said the strikes risk patient safety and will lead to more treatments being postponed.
The British Medical Association (BMA) union, which represents doctors and medical students, said a government offer of a 5% rise was not ‘credible’.
Ministers, meanwhile, said pay talks could only continue if the strike was called off.
The BMA said it was willing to continue talks, and was hoping for a ‘credible offer’ from the government.
The BMA said strikes would take place ‘throughout summer’ if the government did not change its position, with a minimum of three days of walkouts a month, until its mandate expires in August.
The union has been asking for a 35% increase to make up for 15 years of below-inflation rises.
Dr Vivek Trivedi and Dr Robert Laurenson, co-chairs of the BMA Junior Doctors Committee, said the BMA had had three weeks of negotiations with the government, but that ministers would not recognise ‘the scale of our pay erosion’, which they said was equivalent to a 26% cut over the last 15 years.
This is the amount pay has fallen once inflation is taken into account, the BMA says.
At the same time, their more senior colleagues – consultant doctors – are being balloted separately on industrial action in a vote which runs through until 27 June.
Junior doctors make up around half of all hospital doctors in England and a quarter of all doctors working in GP surgeries. The BMA represents over 46,000 junior doctors in the UK.
In Scotland, junior doctors have been offered a new 14.5% pay rise over a two-year period after negotiations with the Scottish government.
BMA Scotland said it would now consult its members, who voted in favour of strike action earlier this month, on the offer.
