"There is no funding, there is no plan, there is no model. You cannot stretch an already under-staffed NHS to seven days withou staff, without funding... and impose a contract"
Dear Reader. Here is a very quick guide to answer questions about the junior doctor pay dispute.
1) "The junior doctors are greedy and just want more pay". The junior doctors and the BMA were not insisting on a new contract. The old one works fairly well, but needed to be updated. The goverment are the ones who want to force a new contract through.
2) "They don't want to work weekends". They already do. Most junior doctors have worked every second or third weekend since qualifying. Like most of us, they'd prefer to be paid more at weekends. The new contract basically defines a weekend as 'Sunday evening'.
3) "They're all communist / Trotsky / lefty militants who want to bring down the Government". They're a bunch of A grade graduates who want to help people. In the 1980s, junior doctors didn't strike over 100+ hour weeks. In the 2000s, junior doctors didn't strike over the career-destroying MMC/MTAS. In fact, this is the first series of strikes in 40+ years. Compare this to tube drivers, who strike far more often. Not exactly militant behaviour by the juniors, is it?
4) "They're playing politics with the NHS". They will be losing a quarter of their monthly wages, and may need to repeat their training year as a result of these strikes. Meanwhile, multi-millionaire, Jeremy Hunt could end the industrial action in seconds.
5) "Fewer than half of them voted to strike". Not true. 98% voted to strike. 58% rejected the most recent version of the contract.
6) "The BMA approved the contract. Now they are going back on it!". The contract was a steaming pile of shite. There were very few concessions by the government. By the end of it, a group of junior doctors appointed as spokesmen had been negotiating with politicians for days, and had just about managed to agree on a contract which resembled a steam pile of shite covered in glitter. On trying to sell this to the rank and file members, they failed. The proposed contract should have been flushed away.
7) "But a 7 day NHS sounds a really good idea!" It does. There is currently funding for 5 days of routine and emergency care, and two days of emergency care. The logical way of getting full seven day is to increase funding, so that a full seven day service can be delivered. And to raise taxes to pay for this. The proposed contract does not offer any extra money, aka "Cost neutral". This is at the time that the NHS is having to make £20 billion cuts every year.
8) "They should sack all of the doctors and get new ones in". To create a doctor, you need a motivated A grade student, and 5-6 years of onerous university training. You then need another 5-15 years to term them into a GP or Consultant. Any idea where you are going to get 54,000 new people who have those qualifications?
9) "They should just train some more, then". Really? Assuming you have the A grade student, and the £250,000 to train them, how are you gone to persuade them to stay in the UK, or indeed in medicine? There are already massive gaps in medical rotas, sufficient to shut down maternity units in prosperous parts of the UK.
10) "Force them to pay back their training, then!". Erm, this isn't going to work. For starters, no one will go into medicine with that threat over their heads. Secondly, with £9,000 tuition fees per per, are you going to include this? Thirdly, are you going to extend this threat to law, engineering, teaching?
11) "But they swore the Hippocratic Oath!" I don't think any doctors have been asked to swear an oath to a bunch of pagan idols for 20+ years. I've certainly never sworn such an oath. A few medical schools offer a modernised version. But this is entirely optional.
12) "That doctor so and so. Her mum was a militant nurse union leader!" So what? Have you seen Jeremy Hunt's family tree?
13) "The senior doctors are all against them". The Academy of Royal Medical Colleges statement is a curious one. Many of the Royal College heads are saying they didn't agree to it. The head of the Royal College of GPs has released a statement stating that they had nothing to do with it. It is true that some senior doctors disapprove. But certainly not all.
14) "Dr So-and-so came on TV and said he's against the strike. And he's a junior doctor". Google these individuals. And then see if they are registered as a trainee on the GMC website. So far, we've had a failed Tory candidate who is currently out of work, a UKIP member who lives in Scotland, and someone who appears to be a full time locum who isn't listed as a trainee.
15) "Half the public is against them". In a recent ITV poll, 90% of respondents supported the strike. Even if a huge cohort of juniors voted, the poll was too large in total to be influenced.
16) "Patients are going to suffer". On one hand, operations will be postponed if the strike goes ahead. On the other, patients will suffer when the NHS collapses as a result of the new contract. Which is the lesser of two evils?
17) "The Tories crushed the miners. Won't they do the same to the junior doctors?" Look what happened to the mining industry afterwards. Do you want that to happen to the NHS? It would seem that Jeremy Hunt does.
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