It comes after thousands of juniors nationwide returned to work this morning after a 24-hour period of reduced “emergency care only” staffing that ended at 8am following the cancellation of 4,000 planned operations nationwide.
Advertisement
In an interview over the weekend, Mr Hunt said the Government was going through the “exhaustive process” of contacting every A&E department in the country to establish whether they would have enough staff to stay open.
Dave Prentis, general secretary of public sector union, Unison, said: “An NHS where the same high quality care is provided, regardless of the time of day or the day of the week, will notcome cheap”.
They are also concerned about the potential removal of contractual safeguards which now protect them from working excessive hours and believe this will impact on patients.
Charles Ashton, Warwick Hospital’s medical director, said: “We are working with the British Medical Association to ensure that patient safety is not affected”.
‘Because of that we chose to require trainee doctors allocated to ward work to attend Sandwell during today’s strike.
Now hospitals that overwork junior doctors face financial penalties, but these would be removed under the new contract.
Ms Ward said: “As always, we would like to remind local residents to consider alternatives first, such as pharmacists, GP surgeries and the NHS 111 service”.
“We have been clear throughout this process that we want to negotiate a contract that is safe and fair, and delivers for junior doctors, patients and the NHS as whole. Elective procedures have been cancelled so really this is no different to Sunday, should you come into hospital on a Sunday”.
Junior doctors don’t want to become embroiled in a political dispute but the Government’s refusal to listen to their concerns has led to this point.
They understand the reason why we took industrial action and it was the right thing to do, for both ourselves and our patients.
The medics are disputing the government’s plans to introduce a new contract which could see their basic pay increased by 11 per cent but could stop them gettting paid for unsociable hours.
While Katherine Murphy, of the Patients Association, warned that the strike would only distress those in need of treatment.
Tuesday’s strike will finish at 8am on Wednesday.
Advertisement
There is a potential for two more strikes in coming weeks if the BMA fail to reach an agreement with the Government – a 48 hour strike on January 26, and a full withdrawal of labour on February.
