Would you support the doctors' strike.

Fight back. How, exactly? Sign yet another petition?

"The NHS is on its knees and unless things change, it may not survive. It has been attacked, part privatised, demoralised and starved of funds.

We have tried to highlight what is going on; through the media, marches, speeches and endless tweets and face-book posts. But it is not working. Things are getting worse and the NHS, which we all care so much about may soon no longer, be able to care for us.

The only things which might save it is if the British public no longer just accept what is happening – but start to fight back. This is above party politics. This is about what we want our society to be like. Fight back for the greatest safety net we have – the knowledge that as a UK taxpayer if we get sick, then we will be looked after; an envy throughout the world."

Three paragraphs from it, for those who do not want to read it all.

He asks that you pass it on by facebook, etc.

think-left.org/2015/11/08/we-need-to-fight-for-the-nhs-or-it-wont-survive/

Please read this. It's not just about junior doctors, but the whole NHS.

When people in offices are contracted to work for about 7.5 hours a day...
As I suggested above it does seem as if increased numbers are considering emigration.
www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/thousands-doctors-quit-nhs-protest-6790624
The profile of those admitted to hospital over the weekend is different to the profile during the working week. Therefore it makes no scientific sense to jump immediately to a "solution" that involves a major change in pay and conditions to an essential group of staff who do not have any other options other than to continue their training in the NHS or leave the country.
Try a private hospital. Consultants come in to do routine operations and go away again. Unlike the NHS, if a patient takes a serious turn for the worse in the night there are no junior doctors to look after you. The consultant has to be phoned and woken up.
I would normally be more inclined to think this initiative is incompetence, inexperience or just plain stupidity on the part of Cameron and Hunt. But given the way they behaved in the recent past...
1. Claiming the NHS was "safe in their hands" before the 2010 election
2. Initiating a major reorganisations when Cameraon had expressly ruled this out during the election campaign.
3 Sneaking through regulations that allow for the privatisation of big chunks of NHS at the last minute, after the Bill had been debated by parliament.
4. Putting billions of pounds worth of NHS England work out to private companies since then - that is billions of pounds going out of the NHS to Virgin Health etc
5. Coming up with ill thought out 24/7 proposals in the face of their 2-3% cut in NHS budget. A huge amount to money and a huge number of jobs if you think about it.
I am driven to conclude that it is neither incompetence, inexperience nor just plain stupidity - it is part of a concerted plan to undermine the NHS to such an extent that very many more people choose private health insurance.
Cameron could never have had his disabled child cared for by the private sector. They don't do that kind of thing.

It is not in their interests because it makes working 12 hours a day from 7 am to 7 pm the norm; and it cuts down the hours for which they can be paid an enhanced rate for unsocial hours. The pay "increase" does not offset this.

I followed the link to gov proposals , www.gov.uk/government/publications/junior-doctors-contract-offer-main-points/junior-doctors-contract-offer-main-points
Could someone tell me why this isn't in their interest? I apologise for joining in a discussion when I haven't been following the junior doctors views in the news , and relying on gransnetters to explain briefly!

I sympathise with the junior hospital doctors, and yes, I would support a strike, they have been allowed no negotiation, and I can think of no other 24/7 service that would accept those conditions being imposed on them.

But my worry for the NHS is primary care.

The GP workforce is aging rapidly, and the pressures, paperwork and bureacracy is driving them into retirement as soon as they can afford it. (estimate at least 25% of them gone in the next 5 years) If we don't make the job of GP a very attractive one, the situation can only get very much worse.

Many years ago, GPs were on call 24/7 every day of the year. Mercifully we moved to GP Co-operatives where they shared the responsibility between local practices. Then the Government told them they could give up OOH completely for only a £6000 pay cut - and they leapt at it, who could blame them! Now we have unsafe services triaged by non-professionanls such as 111 and vast increases in A and E attendance because if you are seriously sick over the weekend or overnight, what are you supposed to do?

Bring back properly funded co-ops run by local GPs if you want to provide a safe service, and the reduction in A and E attendances would pay for a lot of that.

What I don't understand is why we have ample applications for medical training, and only accept a tiny fraction. If the number isn't increased (which means more funding) there will be no option but to put GP services out to private companies, whose focus is naturally on profit first and foremost.

Dj - thanks for the link - assuming a cause for higher deaths without confirming that this is so is clearly nonsense. To base a whole new contract on it is even worse. There may be many other reasons for the higher death rate that are unrelated to staffing levels - for instance the nature of the activities that people undertake at weekends; the prevalence of certain conditions (e.g. heart arrhythmias) to be worse at night etc.

The new contract is effectively a pay cut because of the extension of "normal" working hours that are paid at the basic rate. This is why I feel that the contract (and the way it is being sold to the public as a pay rise and an enhancement to the their safety) is misleading and devious. So what is new? - we are used to the devious nature of political speak. Sigh.

I fully understand why the "junior" doctors are upset by this.

If you have an emergency out of hours, you can go to A&E. The reason you may have to wait too long at weekends is that they are full of partygoers who have had too much to drink and often use violence against the staff. I have seen it and I don't understand how anyone should be expected to work under those conditions. But both doctors and nurses do. So yes, I will support them

biddy73 - They did not know when they started out that one day they were going to be hit with a 20-30% pay cut. If police, fire fighters, teachers, transport workers, civil servants, bank staff, care workers.... anyone really, were told they were going to have a salary cut of any size they would walk out. Many of those listed have taken action over not getting a pay RISE. The government is relying on the fact that doctors would not take industrial action lightly and put patients at risk. If they get away with this I would imagine nurses would be next in their sights.
If we want first class healthcare then perhaps we should value those we have invested in and trained. It seems ludicrous that a newly qualified doctor, with all the responsibility that they have is paid the same for a 72 hour week as an NHS administrator working 37 hours. Or an experienced specialist registrar earning about the same as a tube driver.
What will happen is that we will lose our doctors to other countries and we will have to rely on overseas doctors who will not have been trained to the same standards.

fullfact.org/factcheck/health/no_evidence_11000_weekend_deaths_staff_junior_doctors-48964

About your comment on weekend deaths, Lucky.

Doctors do work unsocial hours, evening, nights and weekends. This is about trying to change what is regarded as unsociable in order to save a few pounds here and there. Or perhaps about trying to undermine the NHS itself (Anyone remember a slogan about the NHS being safe in their hands)

There is indeed already 24 hour care in the NHS. I think what the gov is responding to is research that has shown the higher likelihood of not surviving if an admission occurs at night or at the weekends. Whether their response makes a whit of sense is of course quite another matter.

There is a misconception which is perpetuated by the govt and press that we do not have a 24/7 NHS. Hospitals work on 2 level, the standard, routine 5/6 day per week work, with the emergency work happening alongside this. During the 'normal' working week the hospital is fully staffed dealing with routine, scheduled work, I.e appointments, surgeries, routine tests etc. Every day and night, including weekends there are staff working in the emergency departments and there are 'on call' doctors, etc throughout the hospital to deal with emergencies. If you are rushed into hospital as an emergency at any time of the day or night you will be dealt with by a team of emergency specialists who will be able to call on other specialities as required. There will be an on call team for other specialities, cardiac, surgical, orthopaedic etc. this will be the ' junior' doctors, which will include a senior registrar who is only one step away from being a consultant. They will have an on call room to sleep in if the are not too busy to sleep! There will also be a consultant on call on each team. He or she may be at home but a stipulation of their contract will be that they have to live less than half an hour away from the hospital. If you need any urgent tests doing there will be an call person available ( x/Rays, scans etc).
Whilst the NHS is by no means perfect it is a lot better than the govt and press would have us believe.

No they know the set up and this was there choice , I do think there senior doctor take advantage but still no

Many areas don't have such things as walk-ins, they probably only operate in larger towns and cities.

I would agree that sometimes people expect too much from the NHS but then again people can't plan to be ill or need care on Mondays to Fridays, sometimes they fall ill or are in hospital at weekends as well and adequate cover is needed.

A lot of jobs and professions entail working evenings, nights and weekends and people know that when they choose that career path. Doctors are not alone in this.
Doctors should know that they will be required to work unsocial hours - but they should not be required to work so many hours that they cannot do their jobs properly because of tiredness.

After a routine operation a few months ago, instead of going home the same day I ended up staying in the hospital over the weekend. I had excellent care. My GP surgery is open 5 days and half day Saturday, but there are a couple of walkins in the area if you can't wait till Monday. For absolute emergencies there is A&E. Sometimes I think people expect too much from the NHS. Doctors are humans and need as much or more rest as the rest of us. They are intelligent, dedicated people who have spent years training so that they can care for the rest of us, and if they feel that the only thing left for them to do is to strike, I will trust their judgement and support them. Doctors used to be treated with respect, but that is unfortunately no longer the case. Same with teachers.

I support them 100%.

eloethan doctors have to do foundation training in the NHS as junior doctors (equivalent of the old house officer grades) before they can get full registration with the GMC. Without this, they can't work anywhere.
They then have to follow recognised training pathways within the NHS before they can become consultants.

What is forgotten is that a junior doctor is often in his 30s or 40s

Often? If a doctor is still a junior in his/her 40s then that means they either started training later than usual or they have not been considered fit for promotion.

DGodD whom I mentioned in a previous post became a consultant before her mid-30s as did her husband.

I support the doctors. Their starting salary is ludicrous. Also this is Jeremy Hunt doing the re-organising if it has the same effect as the setting up of the CCGs it will be absolute chaos.

jane They do have a choice - they can work in the private sector or they can do agency work.

I think you will find that staff who were originally employed by the NHS but who have now been hived off to the private sector get far worse pay and working conditions.

Admittedly that might be different for doctors because they take a lot of time and money to train - but I suspect other professional and support staff would fare much worse - or they would be find themselves unable to resist the lure of those companies that put profit above any other consideration. There will, of course, always be those doctors who would rub their hands with glee at the thought of the rich pickings that privatisation might offer but I think most doctors genuinely believe in the NHS and don't want to see it ruined.

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/dr-aoife-abbey/junior-doctors_b_8477852.html?utm_hp_ref=uk-politics

This is a very long letter in the Huffington Post from a junior doctor, explaining what she thinks about Hunt's offer, which was given to the media before the BMA. Not a good idea.

fullfact.org/health/junior_doctors_pay_conditions_contracts_dispute-48383

Full fact's take on the dispute. It was written in September, but nothing much has changed since then.

I have no idea, eloethan.
I was simply pointing out that it was a problem. When any employer knows that employees have little choice over who they work for, that potentially leads to exploitation.
I think the NHS has exploited its workers for years, especially since it has become target driven.