Kenya"s health system on the verge of collapse as doctors" strike grinds on

Kenya’s hospitals have almost ground to a halt, with millions facing a third month in a row without healthcare as doctors strike over low pay and poor working conditions.

The public healthcare system has long been overburdened and underfunded, but has now virtually stopped functioning after 5,000 doctors walk out in December after attempts to reach a compromise with the health ministry stalled.

“The machines break down frequently, the doctors are overwhelmed. The patients, they are so many that they are lying on the ground,” said Dr Judy Karagania, an ophthalmology resident at Kenyatta National hospital (KNH) in Nairobi, who is taking part in the ongoing industrial action.

Karagania and her fellow medics are refusing to return to work until the government makes good on a 2013 agreement to dramatically increase salaries, hire thousands of new doctors and address drug and equipment shortages.

Kenya’s health ministry, as well as its president, Uhuru Kenyatta, has so far unsuccessfully tried to persuade union leaders to renegotiate the agreement, saying it is too costly.

As the crisis continues, seven medical union leaders were jailed on Monday for organising the strike, which had previously been ruled unlawful.

Kenyan doctors’ union leaders Ouma Oluga, left, Samuel Oroko, centre, and Allan Ochanji, right, are led away after a court hearing in Nairobi. Photograph: AP

As the standoff drags on, Kenyans are reeling from the lack of care. Patients at KNH, which is the country’s largest public health facility, face long waits to be seen by military doctors who have been drafted in, the sick lying on stretchers in the corridors of the emergency ward with no one attending to them.

“The army doctors are turning away patients,” said Karagania, who normally works as a resident medical officer at KNH. “They’re only handling the emergencies of emergencies.”

Purity Nyaguthie was sitting in the waiting room holding her one-year-old baby, Tasha, who was having difficulty breathing.

The 23-year-old paid £56 for a three-hour taxi ride from her home in Kirinyaga County in central Kenya. X-rays showed pieces of paper lodged in one of the infant’s lung. Anan operation is necessary to remove the paper.

Several hours later, Nyaguthie and her daughter were still waiting for the procedure, which will cost her 100,000 kenyan shilling (£770) because the the family does not have health insurance. It is money Nyaguthie says she does not have, but more concerning is that every hour they wait the chances increase of Tasha’s lung becoming infected.

Nyaguthie blames both the striking doctors and ministry of health officials for the situations. “The government is not meeting their [doctors’] demands,” she said. “But they’re demanding for a high percentage [increase in pay] which the government may not be able to meet.”

While some national and foreign media have reported that doctors are asking for a 300% rise, the unions maintain that it is 96-125% when accounting for inflation.

Karagania, an ophthalmologist, blames the government for stalling.

“[The agreement] was signed four years ago and they have refused to implement it. It’s really unfortunate that the government has pushed us against he wall,” she said. “It’s the government’s responsibility to make sure that every citizen gets access to health. So it’s up to them to end this – fast.”

As for the millions of Kenyans who are struggling to access public health services in the doctor’s absence, Karagania said she hoped her and her colleagues could return to work soon.

“We really empathise as doctors. More than anyone else in this country, doctors can understand their pain. This agreement is for the long-term it’s to sure our children and grandchildren get good healthcare.”

Kenya"s health system on the verge of collapse as doctors" strike grinds on

Polish women strike over planned abortion ban

Women wearing black clothes and waving black flags are demonstrating across Poland, boycotting their jobs and classes as part of a nationwide strike in protest against a new law that would in effect ban abortion.

Many men also took part in demonstrations on the streets of Warsaw, Gdańsk and elsewhere across the largely Catholic nation.

Thousands of people protested on Saturday in front of the parliament in Warsaw. Women were wearing black in a sign of mourning for the feared loss of reproductive rights; they have also warned that some women will die if the proposal passes as it stands now.

Poland already has some of the most restrictive abortion laws in Europe, with terminations legally permitted only when there is severe foetal abnormality, when there is a grave threat to the health of the mother, or if the pregnancy resulted from rape or incest.

But the new law would criminalise all terminations, with women punishable with up to five years in prison. Doctors found to have assisted with a termination would also be liable for prosecution and a prison term.

Critics say that even a woman who suffers a miscarriage could be under criminal suspicion, and that doctors might be put off conducting routine procedures on pregnant women for fear of being accused of facilitating a termination.

Although a ban has received public support from elements within the Catholic church and Poland’s ruling rightwing Law and Justice party (PiS), neither initiated the proposals. They were drafted by hardline conservative advocacy group Ordo Iuris and submitted by the Stop Abortion coalition as a “citizens’ initiative” – a petition considered by parliament once it has received more than 100,000 signatures.

While it was difficult to gauge strike participation in small towns and rural areas, which tend to be more conservative, participation in the cities appeared to be significant on Monday morning.

A large crowd gathered in central Warsaw and people were also out on the streets in other cities.

The private news broadcaster TVN24, with some of its own presenters in black, showed images of establishments joining the strike, including a restaurant in Wrocław that closed to let female employees participate and a museum in Krakow where none of the women showed up to work.

In Częstochowa, perhaps the most Catholic city in the overwhelmingly Catholic nation, the city hall reported that 60% of female workers had not turned up to work.

Pro-choice activists called for the strike, or “national absence campaign”, after the Polish parliament voted on 23 September for Stop Abortion’s proposals to be scrutinised by a parliamentary committee. Women were encouraged to take a day off work and domestic tasks and gather for meetings or demonstrations, to donate blood or do charity work.

Many Polish women say they are sick of deals being cut over their fundamental reproductive and human rights, which they argue threaten both their safety and their dignity.

“A lot of women and girls in this country have felt that they don’t have any power, that they are not equal, that they don’t have the right to an opinion,” said Magda Staroszczyk, a strike coordinator, over the weekend. “This is a chance for us to be seen, and to be heard.”

Organisers cite an assault on women’s reproductive rights that goes beyond Stop Abortion’s proposed ban. A separate, PiS-sponsored bill restricting IVF, which would make it illegal to freeze embryos and allow women to fertilise only one embryo at a time, was also passed to the parliamentary committee stage in September.

Monday’s protest was inspired by an all-out strike more than 40 years ago by the women of Iceland, when 90% of women refused to work, cook, or look after their children for a day in October 1975.

The intensity of the so-called “black protests” has proved tricky for PiS, which presents itself as the guardian of traditional values in a country beset by liberal notions of multiculturalism, relaxed social mores and restrictive political correctness, but which remains mindful of the risks of alienating mainstream public opinion.

The party’s leader, Jarosław Kaczyński, has suggested that the government might accept a compromise whereby terminations carried out because of foetal abnormalities would be banned, but terminations of pregnancies as a result of rape or incest would still be permitted.

Associated Press contributed to this report

Polish women strike over planned abortion ban

Women to go on strike in Poland in protest at planned abortion law

Tens of thousands of women are expected to go on strike across Poland in protest against a new law that would effectively ban abortion.

Poland already has some of the most restrictive abortion laws in Europe, with terminations legally permitted only when the life of the foetus is under threat, when there is a grave threat to the health of the mother, and in the instance that the pregnancy resulted from rape or incest.

Were the proposed ban to be enacted, all terminations would be criminalised, with women punishable with up to five years in prison. Doctors found to have assisted with a termination would also be liable for prosecution and a prison term.

Critics say that would mean that even a woman who suffers a miscarriage could be under criminal suspicion, and that doctors might be put off conducting even routine procedures on pregnant women for fear of being accused of facilitating a termination.

Although a ban has received public support from elements of the Catholic church and Poland’s ruling rightwing Law and Justice party (PiS), neither initiated the proposals. They were drafted by hardline conservative advocacy group Ordo Iuris and submitted by the Stop Abortion coalition as a “citizens’ initiative” – a petition considered by parliament once it has received more than 100,000 signatures.

When on 23 September the Polish parliament voted for Stop Abortion’s proposals to be scrutinised by a parliamentary committee, pro-choice activists responded by calling a nationwide strike, or “national absence campaign”, by women, encouraging them to take a day off work and domestic tasks and gather for meetings or demonstrations, to donate blood or do charity work.

Many Polish women say they are sick of deals being cut over their fundamental reproductive and human rights, which they argue threaten both their safety and their dignity.

“A lot of women and girls in this country have felt that they don’t have any power, that they are not equal, that they don’t have the right to an opinion,” said Magda Staroszczyk, a strike co-ordinator. “This is a chance for us to be seen, and to be heard.”

The protest was inspired by an all-out strike more than 40 years ago by the women of Iceland, when 90% of women refused to work, cook, or look after their children for a day in October 1975.

Organisers cite an assault on women’s reproductive rights that goes beyond the measures contained in Stop Abortion’s proposed ban. A separate, PiS-sponsored bill restricting IVF (in vitro fertilisation), which would make it illegal to freeze embryos and allow women to fertilise only one embryo at a time, was also passed to the parliamentary committee stage in September.

The Polish Federation of Pro-Life Movements, with the support of an MP from a rightwing parliamentary faction associated with Law and Justice, has called for a total ban of the morning-after pill. Under the proposals, anyone caught selling or distributing emergency contraception could be imprisoned for up to two years.

But it is the perceived cruelty of the proposed abortion ban that has united what has long been a relatively marginal feminist movement with many self-identified Roman Catholics who support the existing “compromise” – shorthand for the legislation passed in 1993 that regulates abortion to this day.

“One thing that I think really radicalised women is when they understood that this could lead to incarceration for women who had miscarriages,” says Agnieszka Graff, a commentator, activist, and author of World without Women: Gender in Polish Public Life.

According to a poll for Newsweek Polska, 74% of Poles support the retention of the existing legislation, while research by polling company Ipsos indicates 50% of Poles support the strike, with 15% saying they would like to take part. A further 15% expressed opposition.

“My mother is very Catholic, goes to church every Sunday, and is against abortion just because you might not want the child,” says Malgorzata Lodyga, a junior doctor who supports the strike. “But she is against this law, because if a woman is raped, she will be treated worse than the man who raped her.”

The intensity of the so-called “black protests” has proved tricky for Law and Justice, which presents itself as the guardian of traditional values in a country beset by liberal notions of multiculturalism, relaxed social mores and restrictive political correctness, but which remains mindful of the risks of alienating mainstream public opinion.

The party’s leader, Jaroslaw Kaczyński, has suggested that the government might accept a compromise whereby terminations carried out because of a congenital disorder of the foetus would be banned, but terminations of pregnancies as a result of rape or incest would still be permitted.

Women to go on strike in Poland in protest at planned abortion law

Junior doctors angered by suspension of strike | Letters

Saturday’s decision by the BMA (Junior doctors suspend strike plans due to ‘patient safety’ concerns, theguardian.com, 24 September) has angered junior doctors throughout the country. It was unexpected and, seemingly, unaccountable; despite about 100,000 doctors paying £400 annually to the union that represents us, no one has yet been informed of the breakdown of the vote.

In line with nationwide concerns by junior doctors, consultants and other healthcare practitioners, the Junior Doctors’ Alliance pressure group (JDA) has reaffirmed its commitment to raising public awareness about the dangers to patients in particular, and the NHS as a whole, of the new contract. In the wake of the decision to suspend the strike, it is now more vital than ever to engage in public discussion and affirmative action to ensure this contract is not imposed by health secretary Jeremy Hunt.

We aim to put pressure on the BMA to pursue new action to block the imposition of this contract, and to act as advocates for both doctors and patients alike; to seek transparency and accountability from the BMA to its members; to garner support for further negotiations with the government, and to provide our patients and the wider public with accurate information on how this new contract will devastate the NHS. We urge doctors to support us via our JDA Facebook page.
Dr James Crane, Dr Aislinn Macklin-Doherty, Dr Julia Patterson, Dr Mona Kamal Ahmed, Mr Rishi Dhir, Dr Moosa Quereshi, Dr Benjamin Janaway of the Junior Doctors’ Alliance (JDA)

• To determine the extra funding needed for the NHS (We can afford the NHS. The question is whether we are willing to pay for it, theguardian.com, 22 September), we’d have to know what state it’s in, and we don’t.

We need to collect and use data for the running of public services like the NHS in the public interest, rather than to support political rhetoric. When data is collected selectively by the Department of Health, and it no longer describes the collective experience of those using and working in the NHS, this is not in the public interest.

If we want to have an intelligent conversation about the NHS, the politics must be taken out of it. We need an independent national audit to determine the actual state the NHS is in. Only then can we begin balancing the healthcare that we, as a country, want provided and the amount we will have to pay to make it so.
Amanda Harris
Shrewsbury, Shropshire

• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com

Junior doctors angered by suspension of strike | Letters

Junior doctors suspend strike plans due to "patient safety" concerns

Junior doctors have suspended plans to go on a series of five-day strikes to protest against changes to their contracts after a “vigorous debate” following a change in leadership.

The British Medical Association’s junior doctors committee (JDC) said it would not go ahead with the industrial action, but was “planning other actions over the coming weeks”.

The decision follows a challenge to the leadership of Dr Ellen McCourt, chairwoman of the committee, by doctors from Justice for Health.

McCourt fought off the challengers but there were changes to other members of the junior doctors leadership, who held a summit on Saturday to discuss their new strategy.

“After a vigorous, passionate, thoughtful and wide-ranging debate this afternoon, the JDC has decided to suspend industrial action while planning other actions over the coming weeks,” the committee said in a statement.

The decision was prompted by “feedback from members from every region in England, as well as the views of the wider profession, patients and the public in considering the next steps on the dispute”.

“Our primary consideration in coming to this decision has been our overriding concern about patient safety, the care we provide every day and the ability of the health service to deliver this care,” it added.

“To be absolutely clear, the JDC still opposes the implementation of the contract … The past few months have been difficult and frustrating and we know that members are anxious for information and practical support.”

Junior doctors have been in a long-running dispute with the government over its decision to change their contracts to make it cheaper for the NHS to provide weekend cover.

The health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, decided to impose the new contract on junior doctors, five of whom last week sought to have the decision overturned in the high court. Lord Justice Green’s ruling on that is due on Wednesday.

Union sources say hundreds of trainee medics voicing their concern about the proposed walkouts had led to serious fears that strike turnout would be poor and that the BMA would end up divided, weakened and lowered in public esteem as a result of the stoppages.

Many junior doctors were also concerned that the long duration of the planned strike would put patients’ safety at risk and risk a backlash from the public if anything untoward happened in a hospital while they were protesting outside. Medics have also voiced confusion about the objectives of the stoppages, given that the union’s leadership backed in the early summer the new contract they had negotiated, only to see grassroots juniors reject the improved terms and conditions by 58% to 42%.

McCourt was elected as interim chair after the former leader, Johann Malawana, resigned after 58% of junior doctors rejected a compromise contract.

One senior BMA official said: “Junior doctors don’t want to put patients at risk and don’t want to go ahead with a five-day strike. Quite a few don’t want any more strike action at all. Even the few JDC members who still think that they can’t give up totally wanted the 5-day strike scaled down.

“Junior doctors don’t have the heart or the stomach for this anymore. They don’t see the point of industrial action. They feel let down and blame both Jeremy Hunt and the BMA equally.”

There is also mounting anger and confusion among junior doctors at what many see as the BMA’s lack of clear strategy in first electing to hold all-out stoppages of unprecedented duration without defining what their purpose was.

The Department of Health welcomed the suspension of the strikes, saying: “The best way to rebuild trust now is for industrial action to be called off permanently in the interests of patients – and we urge the BMA to do so.”

The strike action was originally planned for this month, but the first five-day walkout was cancelled after opposition from other members of the medical profession.

Opposition to the planned strikes came from the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, which represents all the doctors’ professional bodies.

Junior doctors suspend strike plans due to "patient safety" concerns

Junior doctors suspend planned five-day strike in September

Junior doctors have called off the first of their planned series of five-day strikes after growing alarm from senior doctors and NHS leaders that the action could endanger patients.

In a statement on Monday afternoon, Dr Ellen McCourt, the chair of the British Medical association’s junior doctors committee, said that the doctors’ union was “suspending the industrial action planned for the week of 12 September”.

McCourt told Jeremy hunt, the health secretary, that he now had a month to stop the imposition of the new contract that has sparked such anger among trainee medics in England over the last year. It is due to start being implemented from early October.

However, the BMA is still planning to stage three other five-day- walkouts, in October, November and December, if Hunt does not respond positively.

However, it is unclear what will happen next after the Department of Health’s initial reaction to the call-off did not indicate if Hunt would do what the BMA are urging him to do and suspend the planned imposition of the contract.

A DoH spokesman said only that: “The public will be relieved that the BMA has decided to call off the first phase of these unprecedented strikes, so this is welcome news. But if the BMA were really serious about patient safety, they would immediately cancel their remaining plans for industrial action which, as the GMC says, will only cause patients to suffer.”

Hunt may clarify his position later on Monday, though, when he makes a statement in the Commons on the long-running dispute.

Mc Court added that the BMA decided to call off next week’s planned action, which saw the BMA being heavily criticised by many medical groups including the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, to ensure that safety of care was maintained.

“Patient safety remains doctors’ primary concern. For the first time in this dispute NHS England have told us that a service under such pressure cannot cope with the notice period for industrial action given,” she said. “We have also listened to the concerns of working doctors, patient groups and the public.”

It comes hours after the General Medical Council, which regulates doctors, warned that “harm and suffering to patients” would inevitably result from the action.

The walkouts were due to include even life-or-death areas of care in hospitals such as A&E, surgery, intensive care and maternity services. An estimated 125,000 planned operations were set to be cancelled as another consequence, leading to fears that patients would suffer pain and distress as hospitals would take months to clear the backlog.

The BMA’s move may be a belated attempt to maintain the profession’s year-long unity over the new junior doctors’ contract, which shattered last week with many leading doctors criticising the intended strikes as disproportionate and likely to threaten patient safety. Junior doctors may also be hoping to keep the public on their side in their bitter dispute with Hunt.

They continued to enjoy around 60% public backing despite the eight days of strikes they staged between January and May in pursuit of their claim that the new contract for England’s 54,000 doctors below the level of consultant was unsafe and unfair.

Junior doctors suspend planned five-day strike in September

BMA calls off September junior doctors" strike after "scores" of protests

A revolt by rank-and-file junior doctors forced the British Medical Association to call off a five-day strike scheduled for next week on Monday, amid worries about the impact it would have on patients and the health service.

BMA insiders say members of the junior doctors committee, who had called the strike last Wednesday, were inundated with “scores, possibly hundreds” of angry protests in the days afterwards, forcing the rethink.

Junior doctors were particularly annoyed and anxious that the BMA had given the NHS just 12 days to prepare for the first of what the doctors’ union later said would be a series of week-long stoppages.

Trainee medics dismayed at the BMA’s decision were worried that the action – which has been due to be the latest protest against health secretary Jeremy Hunt’s new contract for junior doctors – would leave hospitals too little time to arrange to cover gaps in rotas and could compromise patients’ safety, and damage public trust.

Throughout Friday and the weekend, Dr Ellen McCourt, the chair of the junior doctors committee, received a regular stream of emails to her BMA email address from colleagues uneasy at the decision, as did other members of the committee. They demanded an urgent rethink of the union’s position. That played a crucial role in the BMA’s surprise announcement on Monday that it was abandoning its plan to strike next week, even though they had won no fresh concessions from the health secretary.

Dr Ellen McCourt, chair of the BMA’s junior doctors committee. Photograph: Sarah Turton/BMA

McCourt said on Monday that the BMA had called off next week’s strikes to protect patient safety because “for the first time in this dispute, NHS England have told us that a service under such pressure cannot cope with the [12-day] notice period for industrial action given. We have to listen to our colleagues when they tell us that they need more time to keep patients safe.”

The committee’s decision to stage week-long total withdrawals of junior doctor labour across the NHS in England each month until December had prompted such anger that McCourt even received death threats over what some saw as a reckless and indefensible course of action. However, she has not indicated whether those threats came from fellow junior doctors or members of the public.

McCourt revealed in a message she posted on a junior doctors’ Facebook message site on Sunday: “My 64-year-old retired mother has had the press camped outside her house. JDC members’ lives have been splashed across the papers. And I have received threats to my life.” That followed several days of hostile coverage in several newspapers of the planned strikes and of BMA leaders who had endorsed them.

The rolling series of week-long walkouts had been condemned by leading medical bodies such as the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges and the General Medical Council, as well as by some hospital consultants, as disproportionate and risky.

However, Hunt made clear late on Monday that the BMA’s decision to call off next week’s action, while welcome, would not persuade him to lift his threat to impose a new contract on all 54,000 medics working in the NHS in England below the level of consultant from next month. His refusal to accede to the BMA’s plea leaves it unclear as to what the union will now do. Its planned strikes in October, November and December will still go ahead unless he relents, McCourt maintained.

While health secretary Jeremy Hunt welcomed the postponement of strike action, he refused to lift his threat to impose a new contract. Photograph: Carl Court/Getty Images

In a statement on Monday in the House of Commons on the long-running dispute, Hunt – whom Theresa May last week praised as “an excellent health secretary” despite unease in the NHS about his handling of the junior doctors row – said: “This afternoon’s news delaying the first strike is of course welcome. But we must not let it obscure the fact that the remaining planned industrial action is unprecedented in length and severity and will be damaging for patients, some of whom will already have had operations cancelled”.

About 100,000 planned operations will be postponed, and around a million outpatient appointments rescheduled as a result of the BMA’s actions, he said. “We cannot give an absolute guarantee that patients will be safe. But hospitals up and down the country will bust a gut to look after their patients in this unprecedented situation and communicate with people whose care is likely to be affected as soon as possible,” he told MPs.

Despite the BMA’s olive branch, relations between it and the Department of Health grew even more strained when the DH circulated a briefing paper contesting many of McCourt’s claims in her statement announcing that next week’s strike was off, six of which it said were categorically untrue. They also sought to embarrass McCourt, an A&E trainee in Hull, by contrasting her opposition to the contract now with her endorsement of it in a BBC Radio 4 interview on 18 May, the day the BMA and DH announced that a deal had been agreed.

For example, the DH denied her claim that the contract is discriminatory on equality grounds. In May, she told the PM programme that “we’ve come away with an offer, with a contract, that emphasises that all doctors are equal, that has put together a really good package of things for equalities so that we are minimising the issues we had with the previous offer with regards to gender and equality.”

BMA calls off September junior doctors" strike after "scores" of protests

The NHS is in trouble. Jeremy Hunt can’t afford this junior doctors’ strike | Polly Toynbee

The knives are out for the junior doctors as they threaten five-day strikes, starting on 12 September. They can expect both barrels from the Tory press: “How dare the doctors barter lives for cash” asks the Mail. “It will be only a matter of time before the body-count begins.”

The BMA says it will call off the strikes if the government abandons imposing a tougher new contract in October, but the health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, was in a no-turning-back mood on the BBC’s Today programme this morning. The junior doctors’ leader, Ellen McCourt, says appeals to re-open talks have met a “deafening silence”.

Let’s remember where all this began – and it wasn’t with the junior doctors, ploughing on night and day through ever-worsening conditions in the NHS.

This is another of David Cameron’s disastrous legacies. Looking for bright ideas for his 2015 manifesto, he plucked “a seven-day NHS” out of thin air. He used a set of figures purporting to show high weekend death-rates that have since been resoundingly rubbished by health statisticians. Senior figures in the health department warned that squeezing yet more work out of an already stretched NHS was unrealistic and unwise. It was an election slogan, not a worked-out policy.

And why now, of all times? The NHS has never seen such a deep financial crisis, receiving an average 0.8% funding increase over the years since 2010, compared with an average 4% uplift since 1948. The department of health press office dutifully puts out near-mendacious factoids, such as “funding is at record levels, with the highest number of doctors employed in the history of the NHS.” But with the population rising, and especially soaring numbers of elderly people and people with diabetes, Britain still has many fewer doctors, nurses and beds per head of the population, and less money to spend than comparable countries.

What started as a stunt has turned into a confrontation from which the government now feels it cannot retreat

As the DoH knows well, the shortage of doctors and nurses leaves many rotas unfilled, putting extra pressure on staff, especially in A&E. The risk is doctors will flee abroad and to Scotland, while the Brexit vote could mean EU doctors and nurses decide to go home. Is this the time to provoke the precious doctors we have?

Let’s remember who these “juniors” are. They are not rebellious reckless youth, but 50,000 of the cleverest and most hardworking adults of their generation; the cream of their school science classes, serious-minded grown-ups in their 20s and 30s. Doctors are not known for political radicalism, either, so the health department’s statement that they are “playing politics” is well off the mark. They are angry, very angry, that the most dedicated workhorses of the NHS have been picked on at random to have their weekend pay and working conditions worsened. Why? It isn’t even going to save money for the NHS.

What started as an electioneering stunt has turned into a full-on confrontation from which the government now feels it cannot retreat. Theresa May had a long talk with Hunt before reappointing him, arguing for the need to see off these strikers as a matter of her authority. That was a bad mistake. What she needed was a fresh, open mind, someone whose pride was not at stake.

The BMA did all it could: the previous junior doctors’ leader, Johann Malawana, reluctantly agreed a deal which he told his members was the best he thought he could get, and he tried hard to sell it to them. But 58% rejected it in a ballot, he had to stand down and McCourt has taken over. When I interviewed her in April, she was just about to begin her 13-hour Saturday shift in a North Yorkshire hospital, to be followed by 13 hours on Sunday. The new contract will make her work every other weekend and cut her pay. She said “I love what I do in emergency, the variety of cases, working with the sickest patients when you can help them most.” So how did the government manage to provoke such people to this?

On this issue, as with Brexit, May has stamped her political identity. Retreat is unlikely. In a lifetime of covering hundreds of strikes, in my view they rarely begin for good reasons or end well, especially for strikers, however justified. The public has staunchly backed the junior doctors so far, and maybe still will support this most trusted of professions, with the NHS near the top of public concerns. But since many people die every day in hospital, you can bet the rightwing press will find a good case or two where they can claim, however spuriously, that it was the strikers’ fault. That’s the risk the doctors take.

But the risk May and Hunt take is greater. The NHS is paralysed with debt, as hospitals put out bogus plans pretending they will balance their books. The public is rumbling that major re-organisations are planned locally without anyone telling them, under the 44 new STPs, local sustainability and transformation plans. Persuading people that often good plans for joining up health and social care and reconfiguring local services, are not just cuts – when they are happening at a time, in effect, of cuts – would be a Herculean task for a trusted health secretary, but how is Hunt to do that?

These noisy strikes will add to local objections to any changes on the ground. Forcing doctors into this new contract is virtually irrelevant to the current state of the NHS.

The public think they were promised £350m a week more for the NHS as a Brexit bonus, but instead will come to hear of unpopular amalgamations of some A&Es and maternity units. Anyone sensible looking at the current state of the NHS and the problems it faces, would clear the decks of all extraneous trouble – and settling with the doctors would come first.

The NHS is in trouble. Jeremy Hunt can’t afford this junior doctors’ strike | Polly Toynbee

Junior doctors: are you in favour of the five-day strike?

The latest plan of action for junior doctors in England, who are locked in a longstanding dispute with the government over new contracts, is an unprecedented five-day strike this month.

The British Medical Association (BMA) agreed on a walk-out on Wednesday, the first since its members rejected the government’s final offer on the contract.

It comes amid a year of strikes (the longest lasting for two consecutive days) and meetings, with more than 100,000 operations and outpatient appointments cancelled so far as a result of industrial action.

Junior doctors seemed close to reaching an agreement with the government in May, when a compromise deal was agreed between the BMA and health secretary Jeremy Hunt. However, there was a split among members when it came to accepting it: 58% against, and 42% in favour.

So what is the feeling among junior doctors now? Are you pro a five-day walk-out or did you vote to accept the deal in May? Are you worried five days is a step too far? Or are you at the end of your tether and think this action is absolutely necessary?

Tell us your views via the form below.

Junior doctors: are you in favour of the five-day strike?

Jeremy Hunt says five-day doctors" strike will be "worst in NHS history"

Jeremy Hunt has accused junior doctors of inflicting “the worst doctors’ strike in NHS history” by announcing a five-day walkout later this month.

In a series of broadcast interviews on Thursday, the health secretary also tried to exploit divisions in the BMA, the doctors’ union, after members rejected a deal over new contracts recommended by the body’s leaders.

Speaking to Sky News, Hunt said: “Patients will be asking why it is that the BMA, who only in May said ‘this deal is a good deal for doctors, a good deal for patients, it’s good for the NHS, it’s good for equality’, are now saying it is such a bad deal that they want to inflict the worst doctors’ strike in NHS history.”

Dr Mark Porter, chair of the BMA council, said the decision to announce five consecutive days of strike from 12 September was made after “long and difficult debates”.

Hunt claimed he was ready to continue negotiations. Photograph: Neil Hall/PA

Repeatedly challenged on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme about the level of support for the strike, Porter did not dispute a claim that the council backed five-day strike action by only 16 votes to 14. But he denied that there had been block voting by consultants and GPs to reject the strike.

The latest planned strike action is the first since BMA members rejected the government’s final offer on the contract in a 58% to 42% vote in July, despite a recommendation to accept by the BMA’s leadership.

At the heart of the contract dispute is Hunt’s proposal to change what constitutes “unsocial” hours for which junior doctors can claim extra pay, turning 7am to 5pm on Saturday into a normal working day as part of a Tory manifesto pledge to create a “seven-day NHS”.

There have been five previous walkouts in the dispute, all this year. The longest lasted two consecutive days, and the first all-out strike – including junior doctors working in emergency departments – was held in April. More than 100,000 operations and outpatient appointments have been cancelled so far as a result of industrial action.

Porter said Hunt had left junior doctors with no alternative but to strike again.

He said: “The reason the strikes have been announced is the continued reluctance of the secretary of state for health to do anything other than impose a new contract on junior doctors, a contract in which junior doctors have demonstrated repeatedly that they do not have confidence.”

He also dismissed a claim by Chris Hopson, chief executive of NHS Providers, that the government and employers side had made 73 concessions in the negotiations.

Porter said: “Anyone could count up the number of commas changed and words inserted into a negotiated document containing tens of thousands of words and come up with a number like 73. That number is completely meaningless.”

He added: “It is time to give up the incremental approach of changing a word here or there. That is not going to work as the doctors have comprehensively shown in the latest referendum.”

“The only alternative that junior doctors have been left with is protracted strike action. The reason this dispute has become protracted … is the insistence of the government on moving ahead without agreement.”

Hunt claimed he was ready to continue negotiations.

“The way to solve the honest disagreement is to sit round the table and talk,” he said. “It is cooperation and dialogue and not confrontation and strikes, which is going to cause absolute misery to hundreds of thousands of families up and down this country.”

Hunt claimed there were only two outstanding issues to resolve. “In July they wrote to us and said there were just four outstanding issues of concerns – we have solved two of those four issues to their satisfaction.

“The main sticking point are two issues around pay: Saturday pay and automatic pay rises for part-time workers. Weekend pay rates for doctors are higher than for nurses, police officers, and fire officers. In the 24/7 society that we live in it is very fair and reasonable deal.”

Jeremy Hunt says five-day doctors" strike will be "worst in NHS history"

Robin Williams" Death Demonstrates Suicide Can Strike At Any Age. Here Are Approaches To Avoid It

It is currently being reported that Robin Williams, 1 of the best comedians and dramatic actors of his time, has died through an obvious suicide. It is hard to fathom that an individual who not only brought us laughter and joy as Mork, Mrs. Doubtfire, and the Genie but also affirmed the deeper worth of residing in Dead Poets’ Society, Good Morning Vietnam, and Goodwill Hunting, could finish up taking his own daily life. But that is the dark irony of getting human.

Another surprise to some may be that Williams would last but not least succumb to depression, which he’d fought publicly, decades right after he appeared to corralled his worst demons, like addiction. The well-known picture of suicide is the one particular presented in Dead Poets, of a younger guy unable to come to terms with adulthood. Our image of suicide typically tends to be young, like Kurt Cobain or Sylvia Plath.  That almost certainly comes from our tendency to romanticize depression, a deadly ailment that is not romantic.

Hunting at the data offered from the Centers for Ailment Management &amp Prevention tells a quite different story. Suicide is practically twice as common among adults as adolescents. Amid middle-aged men and women, it looks to be on the rise. The highest charges are between guys amongst the ages of 45 and 59. Thirty out of every one hundred,000 such males take their lives yearly, compared to about 9 of each and every one hundred,000 girls in the very same age range. For both males and females of that age, the suicide price rose about 50% in between 1999 and 2009, for factors that are not totally clear.

Suicide Charges by age. Source: Centers for Condition Management &amp Prevention

William’s lifestyle brought hundreds of thousands of people laughter and catharsis. His death robs us of that, and robs his household of him. If any excellent can come of this, it may be to remind us that men and women of any age can be suicidal.  The CDC says to view for these warning signs:

• Talking about wanting to die


• Looking for a way to kill oneself


• Speaking about feeling hopeless or obtaining no objective


• Speaking about feeling trapped or in unbearable soreness


• Speaking about being a burden to other individuals


• Rising the use of alcohol or medication


• Acting anxious, agitated or recklessly


• Sleeping too minor or too much


• Withdrawing or feeling isolated


• Displaying rage or speaking about looking for revenge


• Displaying excessive mood swings

The more serious these signs are, the higher the risk is. If a pal or loved 1 is displaying these signs, really don’t leave them alone. Preserve them away from firearms, which are the most widespread implies of self-harm in the United States, and also eliminate any alcohol, medication, or sharp objects. And then get aid. You can call the National Suicide Prevention assist line at 800-273-Speak (8255), or yet another suicide assist line. You can speak to a psychiatrist. You can get your loved a single to the emergency space.

Not each and every suicide can be prevented. But the loss of lifestyle and the damage carried out to these left behind make it worth performing the best we can. And survivors often regret attempting to die. I’m reminded of this passage Tad Friend’s remarkable 2003 New Yorker examine of these who leap off the Golden Gate Bridge:

Survivors typically regret their decision in midair, if not just before. Ken Baldwin and Kevin Hines the two say they hurdled in excess of the railing, afraid that if they stood on the chord they might shed their courage. Baldwin was twenty-eight and severely depressed on the August day in 1985 when he told his wife not to anticipate him home until late. “I needed to disappear,” he explained. “So the Golden Gate was the spot. I’d heard that the water just sweeps you under.” On the bridge, Baldwin counted to 10 and stayed frozen. He counted to 10 yet again, then vaulted above. “I nonetheless see my hands coming off the railing,” he explained. As he crossed the chord in flight, Baldwin recalls, “I immediately realized that everything in my lifestyle that I’d considered was unfixable was completely fixable—except for getting just jumped.”

I locate this letter, by English comedian Stephen Fry, to be beneficial, also. A tip of the hat to science author Ed Yong for displaying it to me. To Fry, depression is a whole lot like the weather.

Here are some apparent things about the climate:

It’s actual.
You can not modify it by wishing it away.
If it’s dark and rainy it really is dark and rainy and you can’t alter it.
It might be dark and rainy for two weeks in a row.

BUT

It will be sunny a single day.
It is not under one’s manage as to when the sun comes out, but come out it will.
1 day.

The sun actually will come out, if not tomorrow, someday. And it is really worth waiting for.

Robin Williams" Death Demonstrates Suicide Can Strike At Any Age. Here Are Approaches To Avoid It

NHS workers to be balloted on strike action over pay

The government’s refusal to let a 1% spend rise demonstrates a contempt for NHS workers, stated Unison. Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

Hundreds of 1000′s of NHS staff will be balloted more than strike action in a row over pay out, it has been announced.

The union Unison mentioned it would ask 300,000 of its members to back walkouts following the government’s decision not to accept a advisable across-the-board 1% wage rise for NHS staff.

If accredited the industrial action will take area in early October, followed by additional waves of strike action.

Hospitals across the nation could encounter disruption if nurses, therapists, porters, paramedics, healthcare secretaries, cooks, cleaners and healthcare assistants make a decision to join picket lines.

The union stated the government’s choice not to apply the one% pay out rise advised by the NHS spend evaluation body would deny 60% of NHS employees and 70% of nurses a shell out rise for the next two many years.

Christina McAnea, head of overall health at Unison, explained: “Balloting for strike action is not an straightforward decision – especially in the NHS. But this government is showing total contempt for NHS staff.

“It has swept aside the spend assessment body’s recommendations and ignored the union’s contact for a honest deal. Our members are angry at the way they are currently being treated and we are left with tiny choice but to ballot for action.

“We hope to work closely with the other overall health unions to strategy and coordinate action. It is not too late nonetheless for [the well being secretary] Jeremy Hunt to agree to additional talks, without preconditions, to settle the dispute.”

The ballot will commence on 28 August and run right up until 18 September.

The Royal University of Midwives (RCM) mentioned it would also ballot its members on no matter whether or not to take industrial action.

It is the very first time in the union’s background that members will be balloted, a spokesman mentioned.

About 26,000 midwives and maternity support workers doing work in the NHS in England will be balloted in September with likely industrial action expected to consider spot in October.

The RCM spokesman explained the action was anticipated to be a quick stoppage followed by action short of a strike.

Members will be asked if they are prepared to get strike action and if they are ready to get industrial action quick of a strike.

“Hard-working midwives are deeply concerned that the independent pay out assessment entire body is getting ignored and the NHS spend framework threatened,” said the RCM chief executive, Cathy Warwick.

“Midwives are at the end of their tether. They have previously accepted lengthy-term shell out restraint and modifications to their pension and terms and problems. Meanwhile they are functioning more difficult and tougher to supply high-high quality care with continuing shortages of midwives and daily pressures on providers.

“In the history of the RCM there has by no means been a ballot for industrial action. Of course it goes without having saying that if it is required to get action RCM members will not put the security and care of women and infants at threat.

“NHS workers have to be valued and relatively rewarded for the work they do. Personnel that are demoralised cannot deliver the high quality of care that NHS end users, including mothers and infants, deserve. Investing in employees is an investment in better care. I hope the government joins the RCM and other unions at the negotiating table, reconsiders their place and seeks a resolution.”

NHS workers to be balloted on strike action over pay

Coalition faces huge strike as biggest unions ballot council workers

Unison leader Dave Prentis said the action could be greater than the 1926 common strike if employees voted for it. Photograph: Paul Faith/PA Wire/Press Association Pictures

The government is this week dealing with up to the prospect of the greatest strike because the coalition came to workplace amid developing anger over spend restraint in the public sector.

The UK’s most significant trade unions are balloting hundreds of 1000′s of council employees in England and Wales in protest at an provide worth one% for most staff.

Unison will announce the outcome of its ballot on Monday, followed by GMB and Unite above the subsequent week.

The Public and Business Companies union is also balloting its members for a strike in a lengthy-running dispute above cuts in the civil support, with the result due by the end of the month.

If workers vote yes, there will be a 1-day strike on ten July, which the Unison leader, Dave Prentis, has predicted could be greater than the 1926 basic strike.

Members of the National Union of Teachers will also take industrial action on 10 July, while firefighters in England and Wales have staged a series of walkouts in excess of pensions in the previous yr and have not ruled out even more stoppages.

Midwives in England could also quickly be balloted for industrial action in protest at the government’s choice not to accept a advisable 1% across-the-board pay rise for NHS employees.

Thousands of midwives and maternity support staff are getting consulted on whether they want a formal ballot for action.

Jon Skewes of the Royal School of Midwives explained: “Midwives are really angry that the government said to them they’d get a 1% pay out rise but now only employees at the top of their pay out scales will get that rise, and it truly is not consolidated into their pay out.

“Jeremy Hunt has picked out wellness workers for harsher treatment method on spend than anybody else in the public sector.

“This is the time for midwives to get a stand since the government is intent on assaulting their shell out and conditions.”

Other well being unions are warning of ballots for industrial action, which could lead to a second wave of public-sector strikes in the autumn.

At the opening of the annual conference of the transport union RMT in Bristol, the acting standard secretary, Mick Income, reinforced calls for co-ordinated action towards cuts and the threat to jobs and operating problems.

He said: “This is the very first RMT AGM given that the death of our standard secretary, Bob Crow, but the fighting, militant organisation that was constructed underneath Bob’s leadership remains in area, as we have proven in a wave of latest disputes from London Underground to Heathrow Express and in ongoing campaigns to defend our members’ jobs, spend and functioning circumstances.

“RMT has lengthy argued for a policy of co-ordinated and generalised strike action that unites every single group of staff threatened with the cosh of austerity and it is encouraging to see that that position is gaining traction the length and breadth of the trade union motion.”

Coalition faces huge strike as biggest unions ballot council workers

Fire-fighters strike causes toast ban at hospital

Toast was taken off the breakfast menu for hospital sufferers as a sudden consequence of final week’s fire-fighter strike.

Managers at one,000-bed University Hospital of North Staffordshire determined to switch off toasters in every single kitchen ward – for worry of triggering a fire alarm – throughout the 24-hour walkout.

Individuals had been forced to opt for cereal, porridge, or basically go with out, even though the fire service ran a lowered services as a result of a dispute in excess of pensions.

Antony Wood, who was currently being cared for on the hospital’s cardiac ward, was denied his favourite-toast and-marmalade by personnel, who said toasters were not getting utilised on ‘health and safety’ grounds.

A spokesman for the hospital explained that its fire safety manager had made the decision to switch off the toasters as a precaution in the course of the strike.

He added: “The Trust takes a selection of actions throughout the days when FBU industrial action is taking area to decrease instantly produced fire alarms.”

The walkout is the newest in a prolonged-running dispute between the Fire Brigades Union and the government, who want to increase firefighters’ retirement age from fifty five to 60 and improve their pension contributions.

Fire-fighters strike causes toast ban at hospital

Nurses" leader to members: do not strike over pay offer lobby your MP instead

‘If you are a nurse, striking indicates abandoning your sufferers,’ Dr Peter Carter advised RCN representatives. Photograph: Alamy

The leader of Britain’s nurses has urged them not to strike above the government’s “insulting” spend provide and advised alternatively they target MPs with marginal seats to consider to force the overall health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, into a rethink.

Nurses would not be justified in taking action, which would be “abandoning” their sufferers, in spite of their rightful deep anger above currently being denied a 1% payrise, Dr Peter Carter, basic secretary of the Royal University of Nursing (RCN), told its yearly congress.

Carter combined a strongly worded assault on Hunt’s “blatantly unfair” determination to reject the NHS spend overview body’s recommendation of a 1% rise for all the NHS’s 1.35 million personnel in England with a heartfelt plea not to walk out in protest.

“I know you’re angry. But nonetheless insulting this government’s pay settlement is, and even so tough that tends to make issues for you, you do want to believe meticulously about any speak of strike action. But if you are a nurse, it implies abandoning your sufferers: leaving individuals babies in the neonatal unit, cancelling that visit to an elderly patient in the local community, strolling out of the emergency department or psychiatric ward,” he advised the four,000 representatives of the RCN’s 400,000 members gathered in Liverpool.

Carter’s intervention comes as other wellness unions – which includes Unison, Unite, the Royal College of Midwives and the GMB – put together either to ballot their members or seek the advice of them about a potential ballot above industrial action brief of and such as a strike. Unions are incensed at Hunt’s determination that only some NHS workers need to get the one% rise, with other individuals missing out due to the fact they currently get boosts to their cash flow by means of the NHS’s extended-established method of yearly shell out increments primarily based on someone’s skills and experience.

Alternatively of striking, nurses should inquire their MP regardless of whether he or she supports nurses obtaining the spend rise and use their electoral muscle – and that of their buddies and relatives – to punish individuals who do not at the ballot box subsequent Could, Carter mentioned.

“There are numerous MPs on all sides of the Residence of Commons that have small majorities, some just a couple of hundred, some even as lower as thirty or 40. There are about one,000 nurses in each and every constituency and if we mobilise ourselves I know that a lot of of people MPs will be seeking in excess of their shoulders and wondering if they will be re-elected at the basic election up coming yr.”

He mentioned nurses should seek to establish the views of all MPs, but afterwards conceded that these occupying the forty most marginal seats could be most well worth pursuing. He advised that nurses target Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs in the coming months as a way of pressuring Hunt to alter his mind.

Offered the latest volatility of politics given that Ukip’s emergence, even MPs with a majority of 2,000 or three,000, who would previously have been regarded safe, may be vulnerable to organised strain, he mentioned. “Now is the time to flush them [all MPs] out to say in which they are standing on well being workers’ salaries,” he additional.

Hunt should not turn into complacent about staff’s deep emotions about NHS spend or “trade” on the reality that he believed nurses should keep away from strike action.

Carter’s phone probably poses a dilemma for NHS unions, which are arranging to consider combined industrial action, if their ballots endorse that. Their present considering is to deploy an overtime ban as an preliminary tactic as a demonstrate of power some time this autumn.

Nurses" leader to members: do not strike over pay offer lobby your MP instead

Strike 2 For After Promising GSK "Stinkbomb" Heart Drug

GSK said today that a massive phase 3 trial of a as soon as highly-promising drug had failed to meet its major endpoint. Final 12 months the firm  announced that one more phase 3 trial with the exact same drug had  failed. GSK mentioned it would “further analyse the information and far better recognize the findings” but that, for now at least, it would not seek regulatory approval for the drug.

The SOLID-TIMI 52 (Stabilisation Of pLaques Making use of Darapladib – Thrombolysis In Myocardial Infarction 52) trial randomized a lot more than 13,000 sufferers inside of thirty days of an acute coronary syndrome to acquire both placebo or darapladib, an anti-inflammatory drug designed to stabilize atherosclerotic plaques. GSK reported right now that the drug did not drastically decrease major coronary events.  The complete benefits of the trial will be presented at a potential scientific meeting.

Last November GSK announced  that the STABILITY trial (STabilisation of Atherosclerotic plaque By Initiation of darapLadIb Treatment) had failed to meet its principal endpoint. In that trial darapladib was in contrast to placebo in more than 15,000 patients with persistent coronary heart condition. The primary final results of the trial had been then presented in March at the American College of Cardiology and published concurrently in the New England Journal of Medicine.

GSK stated that the two trials had uncovered “no significant safety concerns” with the drug. But an ongoing situation has been that darapladib brings about unpleasant odors of feces and urine in some folks taking the drug. This prompted 1 reporter, Matt Herper, to label darapladib a “stinkbomb of a drug.” But unless growth of the drug resumes this will no longer pose a problem for GSK, of course.

Darapladib was originally produced by Human Genome Sciences. It was a essential purpose why GSK acquired that firm.

Strike 2 For After Promising GSK "Stinkbomb" Heart Drug

Unions threaten strike action over NHS pay out settlement

Unions representing a lot more than 100,000 NHS personnel are threatening strike action in protest towards what they say are insultingly tiny shell out rises following the government’s selection to backtrack on its promised 1% enhance for all personnel.

Unite, which represents about 100,000 staff like paramedics and scientists, strategies to consult them about feasible industrial action above the settlements announced on Thursday, which will deny 615,000 employees – about fifty five% of the complete non-healthcare NHS workforce in England – the one% rise.

“We will be consulting with our members about the likelihood of industrial action,” mentioned Rachael Maskell, Unite’s head of health.

She criticised Jeremy Hunt, the wellness secretary, for rendering the NHS pay out review physique “defunct” by ignoring its recommendation that all NHS staff must get a 1% consolidated pay rise, in line with what George Osborne, the chancellor, explained final June public sector staff ought to obtain.

As an alternative he had adopted a “divide and rule” policy in which people 615,000 workers will get their typical annual increments but no actual shell out increase, and the other 550,000 will get a one% a yr rise for each of the subsequent two many years, but as “extra income” rather than a consolidated enhance in their salary.

The GMB, which represents thirty,000 NHS personnel ranging from paramedics to neighborhood nurses, explained it also would ballot its members in excess of an provide it mentioned was “a individual insult” to the workforce.

“GMB members will not stand aside while the government tends to make this kind of direct attacks on their spend and situations,” stated Rehana Azam, the union’s national officer for the NHS.

“GMB will right away begin creating arrangements to consult members who will be asked to vote in a consultative ballot to choose the subsequent actions in this dispute.”

Danny Alexander, the chief secretary to the Treasury, mentioned the government needed to press ahead with public sector pay restraint and that the choices would save £200m from the NHS budget in 2014-15 and £400m in 2015-sixteen.

Christina McAnea, head of wellness at Unison, stated: “This coalition government has taken a scalpel to the shell out body’s report and won’t escape the anger of NHS staff. It truly is a disgrace that 70% of nurses will not even get a spend rise this year – what type of message does this give to the worth this government locations on dedicated NHS staff?

“The government has proven complete contempt for the NHS, contempt for workers and contempt for sufferers and will shell out the price tag at the ballot box. Even a straight one% increase would be nowhere close to sufficient to meet the enormous price-of-residing increases that NHS personnel have had to cope with given that 2010. Personnel are on average 10% worse off than when the coalition came to power.”

Peter Carter, common secretary of the Royal College of Nursing, said loyal employees have been getting taken care of with contempt.

He said: “The government is after once again ignoring the independent spend review body, holding the Agenda for Alter shell out method to ransom, even though expecting NHS employees to be grateful even though their contractually-agreed terms of employment are torn up.

“Less than half of nursing workers at the prime of their pay increment will get a paltry 1% rise, following 3 years of pay out restraint. The rest will simply get what they are contractually entitled to, if they can show they have created their capabilities in the preceding yr.”

In a BBC interview throughout his trip to Israel, David Cameron was asked why he did not truly feel all NHS staff were really worth a one% pay rise.

Cameron replied: “NHS workers are well worth a one% spend rise and absolutely everyone in the NHS will get at least a one% pay out rise, both through the 1% increase or by way of the progression payments that they otherwise obtain.

“But let us look at the big picture here. It is correct to make hard selections about public sector pay. It is excellent that it is escalating and not frozen but it is right to take those challenging decisions due to the fact it indicates we can keep a lot more folks employed, we can preserve a lot more men and women in operate and make positive we commit income on vital treatments, on hospitals, on delivering providers, which is what patients so badly want.”

The government set out how it would implement pay rises for 2014-15 soon after it asked the pay evaluation bodies of public sector workforces to examine how a 1% boost could be utilized. In addition to the NHS choice, the government announced a one% increase for members of the armed forces, contractor medical doctors and nurses, and members of the judiciary.

Departments will award a 1% boost to senior civil servants on a discretionary basis and a 1% rise will be awarded to the majority of prison officers. Police and crime commissioners will obtain no boost.

Alexander also announced that £1bn in employer public pension contributions will have to be paid by personal government departments rather than from the Treasury’s central yearly managed expenditure pot. This will give Osborne an additional £1bn in following week’s budget, which he could invest in infrastructure.

But it also implies personal departments will have to make a higher contribution to pensions. The Department for Schooling will have to pay an further 2.3%, working out at £330m in 2015-16 and £560m in 2016-17. For the civil services it will imply an extra two.two%, working out at £275m a year from 2015-sixteen onwards. For the NHS it will be a .3% improve, working out at £125m a yr from 2015-16.

The Treasury chief secretary mentioned of the 1% spend rises: “Public sector employees make a vital contribution to the efficient delivery of public providers. We need to have to carry on with public sector pay out restraint in buy to put the nation’s finances back on a sustainable footing. We are delivering on our commitment to a 1% shell out rise for all except some of the most senior public sector workers.”

Downing Street recommended that public sector pay out restraint would carry on for years to come.

Asked how long it would final, the prime minister’s official spokesman said: “We have taken tough choices and these will have to carry on going forward and into the next parliament … We have departmental budgets set via to 2015/16 and the government has strategies to deal with the deficit by 2017/18, our fiscal programs. But seem, it will proceed into the up coming parliament, yes.”

Asked no matter whether that meant public sector employees would see actual terms shell out-cuts for the subsequent four years, he mentioned: “In terms of today’s announcement there were some individuals who received progression shell out of an typical of all around three%, in the NHS. I am going to stick to what I had to say about the fact we have been clear about tough selections.”

He also urged unions to speak to the Department of Wellness and NHS England rather than go on strike over the choice not to award a 1% pay rise to workers on progression pay.

“We have trade union legislation and a framework in which trade unions can take their decisions but the prime minister’s extremely clear view is that he often opposes actions which gives disruption to the public,” he said.

“I think there will be a recognition across the nation that this is a difficult choice, I believe absolutely everyone will realize that.”

Unions threaten strike action over NHS pay out settlement