In his remarks, Mr Hunt assured that the junior doctors will receive a basic salary of 13.5 per cent and insisted that no trainee working within contracted hours will have their pay cut.
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Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt is coming under increasing pressure over his decision to impose a new contract on junior doctors.
Prime Minister David Cameron’s centre-right government argues that the reforms are needed to help create a “seven days a week” NHS where the quality of care is as high at the weekends as on weekdays.
The junior doctors strike at West Suffolk Hospital in Bury.
He said: “While I understand that this process has generated considerable dismay among junior doctors, I believe that the new contract we are introducing is one that, in time, can command the confidence of both the workforce and their employers”.
(AP Photo/Frank Augstein). Junior Doctors show placards as they protest over a bridge near the Houses of Parliament in London, Wednesday, Feb. 10, 2016.
The Health Secretary had been warned he could face mass-resignations if a new contract was imposed.
Junior doctors have walked out at Warwick Hospital for the second day as part of an ongoing dispute over conditions and working hours.
The junior doctors stood on the picket line and used banners and posters to gain public attention.
NHS England has said that 1,150 planned inpatient procedures have been cancelled as a result of the planned strike, alongside 1,734 day procedures.
Now there is mounting speculation ministers may soon seek to impose a new contract, potentially inflaming the row further.
Jennifer Redfern, 25, junior doctor and BMA representative for East Lancashire Hospital Trust, said: “We need the government to consider how this will affect us”.
It is unclear at the moment how the BMA will respond to that prospect, although their mandate allows them to call more strikes.
Helen Beck, deputy chief operating officer at West Suffolk Hospital, said eight routine operations, two day-case surgeries and 26 outpatient appointments had been postponed because of the strikes.
Andrew Furlong, medical director at Leicester’s hospitals said just over half – 55 per cent – of the average number of junior doctors had reported for work.
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“We have tried and tested plans to deal with a range of disruptions including industrial action”.
