By David Morris MP
I am not supporting todays’ strike by junior doctors. This is not because I do not support our doctors who do a fantastic job looking after our patients but it is because I do not support the reasons the BMA have given for the strike as they are factually incorrect.
The BMA committees are run by a rag tag group of wannabe labour candidates and activists with more left wing political ambition than Corbyn’s front bench. Through this whole process the BMA have been feeding mistruths to junior doctors, culminating in their incorrect salary calculator on their website at the end of last year.
I would urge all junior doctors to read in detail the 8 page letter that was recently sent to them from Daniel Mortimer Chief Executive, NHS Employers, Dr Mike Durkin
National Director for Patient Safety at NHS England; and Professor Ian Cumming
Chief Executive, Health Education England. The letter explains in full detail what the contract will entail and gives assurances on all of the points they are campaigning on today.
The Government have a clear mandate as a majority Government to implement their manifesto in full, in the manifesto one of the main commitments was for a 7 day NHS. In order to get a 7 day NHS we need to get out of the habit that services are only available in their full capacity Monday to Friday with only emergency, skeleton cover at the weekends. No-one is saying that junior doctors don’t work at the weekends already and I know from my local hospital that they work really hard seeing patients in the most urgent circumstances but it should not be this way. Saturdays should be treated as a normal working day with full staffing levels leaving junior doctors with more help, less work on their shoulders and more time to develop their skills as part of their training contracts. Doctors will be supported to enable them to provide safe care, and consistently excellent care 7 days a week. This doesn’t mean that doctors will be expected to work 6 days a week but that their days off will be on other days during the week as is the same in many other jobs and professions. The reason most if not all doctors go into medicine is to help people and in these proposals the patterns will get a much better and more consistent service over the week.
The existing contract allows doctors to work 91 hours a week and has insufficient safeguards against consecutive long shifts. The new contact addresses this in order to improve patient safety. The new proposal is to introduce an upper limit of 72 hours in a 7 day period, a maximum of 4 consecutive night shifts, or 5 consecutive day shifts, which vastly improves on current safeguards. This will give doctors more rest in between on call periods and provides greater flexibility on the rota system. In addition to this there will be a need for employers to highlight in the work system learning opportunities and how these doctors learning needs are met.
I understand that initially concerns over pay, but the Government have promised that no junior doctor working within the legal guideline of maximum hours will be paid any less than they are now, instead they are proposing a pay rise. The annual increments system will be reformed to increase pay linked to responsibility and not just time served which ensures that junior doctors are being paid adequately for their responsibility level. As the basic level of pay is being increased this means that junior doctors are earning extra pensionable pay as opposed to overtime which will means that their pension will be topped up as well as their take home pay being protected or increased. If you are a junior doctor and want to see how this works in practice please visit the pay calculator on the NHS employers website.
The BMA should put their own party politics and political aspirations aside, take a grown up view on the matter and go back around the negotiating table and agree a deal which will be better for our doctors but most importantly better for the patients they care for.
NB: I also took part in the Victoria Derbyshire Show on this topic on the 12th January, a link to my appearance can be found here at 01:38:00
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b06vhhxd/victoria-derbyshire-12012016