“On the final unresolved issue of pay for weekend working, we remain willing to show flexibility and negotiate in good faith”.
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There would also be cuts to the times for which they could claim extra pay for working unsocial hours. Overtime hours are now between 7pm and 7am Monday though Friday, and all day on Saturday and Sunday. While weekends are now paid at a higher rate, the governments proposed contract would include 12 Saturday hours at the regular pay rate, as well as extending the regular pay rate three hours each weekday evening.
Doctors will be out on Lemon Quay in Truro in an attempt to raise awareness of what changes the new contract will mean from noon next Tuesday.
Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust had already cancelled 40 operations to cope with the prospect of industrial action, a quarter of total operations, as well as nearly a tenth of its 4,500 appointments.
BMA chairman Mark Porter has stated that all it would take to have the strikes called off is for the government to be serious in their negotiations.
“Despite overwhelming support for industrial action, the BMA instead sought conciliation talks with the government, talks which were initially rejected and delayed by Jeremy Hunt”.
The junior doctors strike is back on following allegations that Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt had lied about the health of negotiations between the Government and medical unions. The government initially rejected our offer of talks and failed to make significant movement during negotiations.
The BMA had until midnight to decide whether it still wanted to take industrial action – or face having to re-ballot its members.
She said: “Once again patients are being caught in the middle of this bitter dispute”. Doctors argue that while this seems to help overall, reducing the hours during which they can receive overtime is bad for the doctors and the patients in the long term.
A spokesman for the trust added a meeting is set to go ahead tomorrow and more information, including whether scheduled operations will need to be cancelled, could be released afterwards. “All parties in the dispute must remember that their primary duty is to patients”. Though these talks have been going on for three weeks, and a number of issues have been resolved, junior doctors are still upset about their pay.
The BMA had said the changes to junior doctors’ contracts would put patient safety at risk.
British health secretary warns that the strikes by junior doctors in England could be “very damaging” for patients.
“The truth is that the whole system is under intolerable pressure”.
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He added: “We have a situation where every weekend in the NHS we have lapses in care, that we are not able to promise NHS patients the same high-quality care every day of the week”.
