Would you support the doctors' strike.

Yes definitely would support junior doctors' strike.

Talking to my hairdresser the other day. He has an uncle who is a hospital consultant. He was amazed when I mentioned that junior doctors have to spend long hours on studying as well as the long hours at work. They have to pass lots of difficult exams if they are to progress to consultant level. My cousin who is register was having to produce a piece of research for the equivalent of a master's degree at the same time as working. All the more reason why the protection of their working hours should not be removed.

www.opendemocracy.net/ournhs/caroline-molloy/jeremy-hunt-george-osborne-and-other-nhs-shambles-this-week

It was this one, Lilygran, about the mandate.

I put that link on earlier, Lilygran, or it was one from the NHA. I did actually manage to fill in one of the surveys, so I have had input, but not many others that I know of. The email box was full according to the NHA, but they had a way round it.
Another trick was for the mandate to have a big sign on it, taking up a lot of space, so the survey was returned as it was too big. Clever of them.

Hunt has agreed to go to Acas with the doctors.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/nov/25/junior-doctors-strike-jeremy-hunt-agrees-to-acas-talks

I would be happy to pay a little more tax to protect the NHS, care for the elderly and help for struggling public sector workers who may well lose tax credits or housing benefit. The vast majority of the salary bill in public sector goes to people who earn average or low salaries.

Has everyone seen this? We are being consulted about the future of the NHS but not very effectively www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/19/nhs-mandate-england-consulation-deadline

If I'm honest I really don't want to pay more tax although I would pay more if I thought it would make a difference. What I do not agree with though is paying more tax in order for the public sector to carry on running like a gravy train. With many at the top creaming the money off. Taking early retirement and then coming back as "consultants" and advisors. The 2 biggest health authorities here in the North East have suffered because of this with a husband and wife team both retiring, getting their massive payouts and returning to their posts within weeks. How can that be right?

Someone my DH knows very well "works" in the civil service and is being made redundant next Friday. He is receiving a payout of £175,000. (Apparently he is not happy and thought it would have been a lit more). He is however, overjoyed to know that he will be returning to his job (with a different job title) straight after the Christmas break.

The whole thing needs a massive kick up the pants.

whitewave you tried to get one going earlier this year, and you did some excellent research into how other countries manage their services. We need to take politics out of this, but sadly it all starts creeping in again and goes nowhere. And, before someone else says you can't take the politics out of heakth funding, it doesn't have have to be political, there are other ways.

I would love a proper non-political debate in this country about the NHS and the future.

All this hoo-ha about 7 day working is part of a general attack on the NHS - reorganise it, slowly starve it of money, abuse the hard -working managers ("bureaucrats" as Cameron repeatedly called them in the election campaign) and then impose on the management a crazy demand to manage a great deal of unnecessary change in terms of how hospitals are organised.
Police? Crime figures have been dropping steadily for a long time now. No reason to think that having more police will have an impact on terrorist attacks before or after they happen.
Bombing Syria - now that looks like a good way of increasing the risk of terrorism in the UK...

All these have to be paid for. Either we're all prepared for a substantial increase in basic tax or we continue to have reduced services until we can afford them. I'd be happy to pay more tax but I wonder how many agree.

In Australia rosequartz there is a roughly 50:50 public private split in health care. Most Australian doctors (I suspect) tend to work in the private sector by preference as the financial rewards are higher. Therefore the Australian government recruit foreign doctors to fill the gaps in the public hospitals. (this is based on people I know there and here - not on statistical evidence).
In NZ the system is similar to here.

Quickly followed by nurses, the rest of the NHS, the teachers, civil service pen pushers, firemen (and women) not forgetting the police force .........

Two billion sounds a lot, but when you think about the amount they will have to pay in redundancy, it does not go far.
It was said that the number of police in Paris last week equalled the number of police in the UK. We need more police, not less, in case of attacks, I would have thought. Isn't it Theresa May who is cutting the size of the police force?

Perhaps the police forces will have to dig into the reserves they are sitting on to pay for the type of policemen who look after the public and not waste the money on their top people

Osborne has shaken the magic money tree, for the NHS and the forces.
We'll find out tomorrow who pays for it.

Teacher11, a review of mortality rates when doctors strike showed that fewer people died; something else that Hunt got wrong.
The link is at the top of this page if you want to look at it.

Extra support staff, ie nurses, X-ray and laboratory staff, etc would be needed to provide diagnostic tests often necessary. Not to mention administration staff. Is it realistic to expect the doctors to work without the normal support services available during the week. Even with the increased NHS funding announced today I cannot believe it would cover all the extra costs involved. If the NHS want more doctors to work to cover 7 days a week then they must provide the extra support services too. Perhaps this call on doctors to work at weekends is just the beginning and the other services will be told to work the same hours as well.

And, of course, what is often not mentioned when people bemoan the fact that:
a) doctors leave the UK to work abroad and/or
b) the NHS is being privatised by the Tories

is that they go overseas to work where there is no NHS and they are working privately.

No, let's just shake the magic money tree and maybe we could give the doctors fewer hours to work for a mahoosive payrise like the last government did.

When I was teaching the pupils who went on to be doctors were the cleverest, nicest, most hardworking of the bunch. I have no hesitation in saying that they (and their strong arm union, the BMA) will run rings round the government.

And, no, they shouldn't be striking. If the Tube workers strike London merely grinds to a halt. If the doctors strike, people die.

There are about 1.3 million Britons living in Australia, so 350 British doctors working in A&E are not that many - and many of them do come back again.
We met one today.

Well I believe it is the nurses turn next.

One thing we must remember is that medics exist in a global market. If we don't give our junior docs good pay and conditions they will vote with their feet. Thousands are doing this already. I read somewhere that 350 uk trained A and E docs are currently working in Australia. They're not just there for the surfing! We end up recruiting doctors from countries where they are desperately needed. We must pay our doctors well and make sure their conditions are tolerable.

To have the same care at weekends it doesn't take a genius to work out - employ the same number of staff as in the week , not work a skeleton staff to exhaustion , too complicated for Hunt to work out ?

To organise more fully-staffed shifts you would need a lot more staff = more costs. The spin factor of Hunt's 'seven day week' health service is so obvious as well as the fact that he has never actually explained what he thinks it means. Hospitals do offer a 24/7 service but at some times (2 am or Sunday afternoon, for example) it's largely an emergency service. If you need to see a doctor at 2 am it should be because it's urgent. If it isn't urgent, surely you can wait till 8 am? And as Carolynswalsh says, to offer a full service all round the clock would need all the hospital staff, not just doctors. There must be some points in the 24 hours and the 7 days when even Hunt thinks hospitals do not need to offer a full service with a full complement of doctors, nurses, cleaners, labs, pharmacy, X-ray, scans, receptionists, secretaries, admin, physio, social workers, transport, porters, coffee shop.....