Resident doctors’ 29% pay claim is non-negotiable, BMA chair says | Doctors

The demand for remuneration of 29% of resident doctors is not negotiable, reasonable and easily affordable for the NHS, said the new chief of the medical profession.

Strikes to ensure that residents – formerly junior – doctors in England get 29% could flow for years, according to Dr. Tom Dolphin, the new president of the British Medical Association Council.

The union of doctors will not negotiate or accept a lower figure because it is the extent of the loss of real gains from resident doctors since 2008, which they wish to restore – in full – Dolphin told the Guardian in his first interview since last month withdrawal.

The demand of 29% is not to negotiation “because it is based on a principle,” said Dolphin, an anesthesiologist consultant. “If we choose a different number, that would not reach the restoration of remuneration. This is why it looks inflexible.”

Dolphin blamed the five-day strike that tens of thousands of resident doctors plan to stage later this month on Wes Stting, the Secretary of Health, giving them a salary increase of 22% over two years last year, but not following it with a sentence this year to take into account the 29% complaint. He said that the disturbance that the 120 -hour rating would cause was his fault, not theirs.

Dolphin said: “Our expectation was that the [22%] This would be the beginning of a trip that would make us continue until we have reached the value we had in 2008. So, clearly, the return of the value has stopped and now it only walks on the spot. And we have to continue this trip.

“He [29%] is reasonable because it is based on the loss of value we had. The number is so large because [previous] Governments have ignored the BMA in series when we said it establishes a problem. »»

The ministers fear that a renewed series of strikes could encourage other employees of the NHS public sector to submit complaints for significant salary increases, wreaking havoc in the NHS.

Dolphin said doctors felt betrayed by street and government to only afford 5.4% this year and, because the reform has promised the organizational examination of doctors and dentists, who advises ministers, had not led to recommended increases reflecting the value of doctors.

Street and BMA are locked in an increasingly angry dead end and war of words. Street has argued that the government would not return to the 5.4% salary increase it gave resident doctors for 2025-2026 and qualified their 29% “completely unreasonable” complaint, in particular given the difficult state of public finances. But the union said that it would continue to stage debraying until its members receive 29%.

Dolphin offered a potential way to avoid a six -month campaign, saying that doctors were “flexible” to reach their 29%goal, ideally in an agreement covering the next three years.

“It’s a few percent [more than the 5.4% already awarded] This year, more percent next year [and] More percent the following year, “said Dolphin.” However, that might seem, they are flexible on this subject. “”

Resident doctors rejected the price of 5.4%, although it is the most granted to any group of public sector workers because it contains “no restoration element”.

Dolphin accused the Minister of refusing to meet the BMA and to use “emotional language”, for example by saying that neither the public nor he would never forgive them for strikes, rather than discussing the complaint.

Streetting suggested in an interview with LBC on Thursday that if the doctors accepted less favorable NHS pensions in exchange for a higher salary during their career, this could provide a basis for a discussion of their financial requests.

But Dolphin insisted that the NHS could afford to respond to their requests. Although the gross cost of delivery of the full restoration of 29% or 1.73 billion pounds sterling, which drops to 920 million pounds sterling once the money has returned to the Treasury through the tax regime, he said. This 920 million pounds sterling represents less than half a hundred of the budget of 190.8 billion pounds sterling of the NHS this year, he added.

“It is a small proportion of the budget. [29%] It looks like a large number but in fact, put in the context of the whole NHS, it is not a large sum compared to this, “he said.

Junior doctors organized 11 strikes, totaling 44 days of industrial action, between March 2023 and July 2024.

Dolphin said the latest strikes could last for years. “This campaign has been going on for several years already. We are determined to restore the remuneration that doctors deserve and it is to the Secretary of State how long it takes to do so,” he said.

Concede at the request of 29% would be good for the NHS because it would make doctors more motivated and make them less likely to move abroad, said Dolphin.

The Hospitals group, the NHS Confederation, said the strike would undermine the government’s promise that 92% of people waiting for hospital treatment received it in the 18 weeks by 2029.

Rory Deighton, the director of his acute network, said that waiting times improved, as evidenced by the small fall in the size of the care backwards presented Thursday in the last monthly NHS monthly performance figures in England.

However, he said: “To respect the government’s ambitions … will be made even more difficult if resident doctors have dropped tools and go on strike, because he could see tens of thousands of appointments and operations canceled as other staff members – including consultants – are diverted to cover the gaps.”

Last night, Professor Robert Winston, the peer of labor who launched fertility treatments in the United Kingdom, said that he had left the BMA after more than 60 years as a member, that “very dangerous” strikes would damage the public in the profession.

Winston, 84, told Times: “I am very convinced that it is not the time to be striking. I think the country is really struggling in any way, people are struggling in all kinds of ways.

“The action strike completely ignores the vulnerability of people before you. Doctors must be recalled that each time they have a patient in front of them, they are afraid and suffers. It is important that doctors consider their own responsibility much more seriously. ”

He urged the BMA to work with ministers to negotiate solutions with the government, such as improvements in “appalling” working conditions and night quarters.

The NHS bosses disagreed with Dolphin’s remarks. Danny Mortimer, director general of employers of the NHS, who represents NHS trustees in remuneration negotiations with unions, said: “Our members will not recognize the characterization by the BMA of the quality of the response that resident doctors have received from this government or the worrying realities of the finance of the public sector and the NHS.”

The Ministry of Health and Social Coins said that Dolphin’s remarks have shown that the BMA was “unreasonable and irresponsible”.

A spokesperson said: “The Secretary of State was clear that his door remains open to discuss with the BMA a range of problems that would improve the professional life of resident doctors.

“It is unreasonable and irresponsible for the BMA to even refuse to sit to speak when it threatened a strike action which will have a serious impact on patients and other members of NHS staff. It is not too late to step back after the brink and work with the government to avoid the strikes and continue the work we have done together to rebuild our NHS. ”