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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think the BMA have misjudged with another doctor's strike?

1000 replies

Locutus2000 · 08/07/2025 11:58

Last year they got more than anyone else in the NHS along with an improved deal. Nurses and other AHPs received lower rises.

BMA have just announced another 'resident' doctor strike continuing to chase pay restoration to 2008 levels.

Having just had the major win with changes to IMG prioritisation and the clamp-down on PAs it feels a bit tone-deaf and I can't see Streeting going for it.

Resident doctors in England vote to strike over pay

Vote comes after BMA criticised ‘woefully inadequate’ 5.4% award for medics formally known as junior doctors

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/jul/08/resident-doctors-in-england-vote-to-strike-over-pay

OP posts:
Thread gallery
67
oddandelsewhere · 14/07/2025 21:22

@mumsneedwine you know perfectly well that I have said nothing libellous. I voiced an opinion about you calling responsible doctors who put their patients first 'scabs'.I

Why are you allowed an opinion (that non striking doctors are scabs), but I am not allowed an opinion (that that is an unacceptable way to talk about them) ?

mumsneedwine · 14/07/2025 21:27

@oddandelsewhere you accused me of derogatory language towards @Needmoresleep DD. Where ? She isn’t even going on strike as not in England. So either quote me being personally nasty or apologise. Because your accusations are libellous .
@Needmoresleep DD is an awesome human who I have never said a bad word about

mumsneedwine · 14/07/2025 21:27

I called people taking locum shifts for striking doctors scabs. Because that is the name given to strike breakers. If you have another name please let me know

OonaStubbs · 14/07/2025 21:35

Being a physician is supposed to be a vocation, not something you go into for the love of money.

BIossomtoes · 14/07/2025 21:38

oddandelsewhere · 14/07/2025 21:22

@mumsneedwine you know perfectly well that I have said nothing libellous. I voiced an opinion about you calling responsible doctors who put their patients first 'scabs'.I

Why are you allowed an opinion (that non striking doctors are scabs), but I am not allowed an opinion (that that is an unacceptable way to talk about them) ?

This is like being back in the 70s. I don’t think even Corbyn would refer to “scabs” any more.

ThePure · 14/07/2025 22:20

mumsneedwine · 14/07/2025 20:50

I feel the 4 Yorkshire Men have entered the conversation.

When I were a junior Dr….

It is true though and I am only mentioning it so that the context that older Drs are speaking from can be understood and why we might be losing patience with covering for pay strikes at this point.

You keep saying we didn’t have student loans (I did but not as much as now) and we had guaranteed jobs (I’ve explained previously how I lost mine whilst pregnant in the MMC fiasco) and living costs were cheaper and that’s true but we did have much more brutal hours, a very tough culture with no allowances whatsoever for illness or bereavement and certainly no ‘reasonable adjustments’ and we had all the 6 month rotations and exam fees just the same.

Marchesman · 14/07/2025 22:21

mumsneedwine · 14/07/2025 17:14

Not quite so well paid in other areas, London weighting for doctors is £2,000 and for rest of NHS £8,000. Simple things like this could be changed.

I hate that many doctors are unemployed, more than anything else. I have tried v v hard to do all I can to change this as you know. And still am, this fight has not finished.

Let’s hope talks are productive this week and strikes do not happen, no one wants them.

What exactly have you done to "change this"?

And which "fight" do you have in mind when you say "this fight has not finished."

Because the government is committed to increase medical school graduates from 8000 to 15,000 p.a. (which is nicely on track), decrease foreign graduates in training posts by 1.5% points p.a. for ten years, (which is optimistic), increase training posts by a total of only 1000, and not increase consultant posts at all.

I would be fascinated to learn why you think that helping with UCAT preparation and widening participation efforts as a secondary school teacher is going to have a beneficial effect on medical unemployment.

Willyoujustbequiet · 14/07/2025 22:26

mumsneedwine · 14/07/2025 21:27

@oddandelsewhere you accused me of derogatory language towards @Needmoresleep DD. Where ? She isn’t even going on strike as not in England. So either quote me being personally nasty or apologise. Because your accusations are libellous .
@Needmoresleep DD is an awesome human who I have never said a bad word about

Please stop repeating this nonsense.

An essential element of libel is that a claimant can be identified. You are anonymous on here. Ergo libel is simply not possible.

Marchesman · 14/07/2025 22:41

ThePure · 14/07/2025 22:20

When I were a junior Dr….

It is true though and I am only mentioning it so that the context that older Drs are speaking from can be understood and why we might be losing patience with covering for pay strikes at this point.

You keep saying we didn’t have student loans (I did but not as much as now) and we had guaranteed jobs (I’ve explained previously how I lost mine whilst pregnant in the MMC fiasco) and living costs were cheaper and that’s true but we did have much more brutal hours, a very tough culture with no allowances whatsoever for illness or bereavement and certainly no ‘reasonable adjustments’ and we had all the 6 month rotations and exam fees just the same.

It is ironic, given how much help juniors get with everything now, that they (and their parents) think life was easier in the past.

Favouring "soft" skills such as empathy over academics hasn't done much for professionalism and putting patients first, either. But I never thought that was going to end well.

Fringle · 14/07/2025 23:05

Willyoujustbequiet · 14/07/2025 21:14

OK I can see my point has gone over your head and I have no wish to ridicule.

Libel is a false written statement that damages a person's reputation. This is an anonymous forum and you aren't identified. Your reputation cannot be damaged when nobody knows who you are.

I hope that makes it a bit clearer for you

How do you know she’s not actually called Agnes Mumsneedwine (of the Hereford Mumsneedwines) and is readily known by that name to many people who matter?

Willyoujustbequiet · 14/07/2025 23:40

Fringle · 14/07/2025 23:05

How do you know she’s not actually called Agnes Mumsneedwine (of the Hereford Mumsneedwines) and is readily known by that name to many people who matter?

😂

mumsneedwine · 15/07/2025 09:23

I never understand why being unkind is seen as amusing. But if it’s making you all happy then carry on.

TweedleDumbAndTweedleDeeeeeeeee · 15/07/2025 09:45

Hotsausage2 · 08/07/2025 11:59

They deserve to have pay restoration. As an HCP I also deserve it. Good for them for actually having the grit to fight for it. Unlike the RCN who rolled over like a kitten for the nurses.

You sound very entitled. Get over yourself!

Gghhhd · 15/07/2025 09:50

If the public finances are in trouble. They should just accept what they have.

TweedleDumbAndTweedleDeeeeeeeee · 15/07/2025 10:09

Another summer. another Doctor Strike. Surprise, surprise!
If they don’t go to work, they shouldn’t get paid. It’s nothing but bloody greed and arrogance and it makes you wonder why they enter into the profession in the first place. Shameful!
Being junior / studying in any profession can leave you out of pocket but not everyone can afford to go on strike. Imagine if we all did that. A lot of these qualified doctors receive incentives such as Relocation Packages and Golden Handshakes but they conveniently forget about that when they go on strike. They are in a position of privilege compared to a lot of people and they should really take the time to think about that rather than keep demonstrating how greedy, uncaring, unprofessional and entitled they are.

Needmoresleep · 15/07/2025 11:39

ThePure · 14/07/2025 19:00

That was the situation when I was an SHO
-When you worked a weekend you worked Sat &Sun 8-8 and you worked the usual 8-6 every day the week before and the week after ie 12 days straight
-A week of nights was Weds to Weds so that you could have Thurs, Fri and the weekend off to recover afterwards and then go back the next week
a few hours unpaid overtime a day was the norm
This was all considered wholly normal.

When junior Drs started to be entitled to a whole week off after night shifts and a whole day off after just a long day/ evening shift I thought it extremely generous.
Then there was ‘exception reporting’ where they got time off in lieu for staying even 30 mins late

It is good in some ways as the conditions were too hard but all these days off reduce your clinical experience and your ability to benefit from time with your consultant to the point where I started to find it necessary to have a PA or specialist nurse to get some continuity of care for my patients as the juniors were never there. It made it less satisfying to train them I’m afraid

I’m not trying to be a dinosaur and saying that the way I was trained was good (‘This is going to hurt’ gave me flashbacks) but it had some good things and we have thrown the baby out with the bath water. Medicine is a vocation not a money making exercise. It has always been a hard path and it always will be and we need people who are willing to sacrifice a bit in my view and to our others before their own self interest.

Interesting. The English F1/F2 contract does seem a lot more generous. Yet when it comes to exams there is no allowance for those who because of their work schedule have less time to prepare. So less pay, longer hours and less chance of getting onto training.

I think DD is supposed to get 48 hours between coming off nights and starting days, not a week. It did not stop one administrator trying to get her to start the day shift on a new rotation an hour she finished a night shift. Two days of emails and they compromised on 24. In her first rotation she worked ten days at a stretch including 13 hour longs. It was a busy ward with a lot of (expected) deaths and there was plenty of running round the hospital with a bleep at nights trying to be in two places at once. Time off was inevitably punctuated by calls from funeral directors and some compulsory training was expected to be done in your own time. My understanding is that it is not unusual to stay on after a busy shift to complete a handover. I have never heard her mention exception reporting. Her current rotation is also busy with clinics on different sites, and a weekend of batch cooking in advance. There were points where she was exhausted but I think (other than not having a job to go to) would choose the same again. The point of F1/F2 was to get good hands on experience.

One caveat is that the burn out rate amongst F1/F2s has been high. But then burn out is apparently happening at all levels. In the past when F1/F2 allocation was on merit, gentler rotations defacto went to those with fewest points, ie those in the bottom percentiles. I wonder what will happen to weaker F1s now that they are more likely to be thrown in the deep end. One issue I assume if that everyone is now is busier so there is less support. (Again English F1s seem to get a lot more allocated support and study time.)

It is interesting that you see PAs as providing patient continuity, even within an F1/F2s four month rotation. This would suggest that consultants would, reasonably, prioritise their training over rotating F1/F2s. What a pity the scope to hire soon to be unemployed "F3s" to these roles is so limited.

It all sounds like an own goal.

Her Australian application asked a lot about her experience. I have heard that young UK doctors have a bit of a reputation for having to adjust to a higher work rate. I really hope she can find something where she is, she is very happy there. However she is already starting to think that Australia might provide a chance to practice medicine under less challenging conditions. I still don't understand why Wes is not making more effort to retain competent UK trained doctors.

Nor, to get back to OP, why the BMA is so silent. They may get more pay, but with it may come the NHS they deserve.

Hotsausage2 · 15/07/2025 12:06

TweedleDumbAndTweedleDeeeeeeeee · 15/07/2025 09:45

You sound very entitled. Get over yourself!

Why is it entitled to get paid what I deserve after years of relative pay cuts?

ThePure · 15/07/2025 13:28

I thought a lot of the new contract was an own goal

Honestly I thought there was too much time off to the detriment of on the job training. Doing the job started to be denigrated as ‘not allowing training opportunities’ whereas I think that managing patients IS a training opportunity far more valuable than going to a lecture or a conference at that stage.

It has made their jobs actually worse IMHO. Yes they get a lot of lovely days off after nights and weekends (book your 2 weeks leave after a week off after nights and lo and behold you can have almost a month off!) but then they have to cross cover for their colleagues who have the same so that when they are at work the job is twice as busy as there is never the full amount of Drs present. I would rather have less time off and more continuity of care and chance to work with my clinical team and see patients journeys through as I think that is how you actually learn.

I had to approve annual leave and study leave requests when I was IP consultant and honestly it was nearly the end of me. Trying to make sure we had enough Drs on the ward was a nightmare and the grief if I had to say no to requests was unreal. We ultimately had to employ non training grade Drs just to get safety and continuity and when they were in short supply or too expensive we got a PA and a specialist nurse instead. They are always around and don’t have the shift work, days off and study leave entitlements that Drs do and they don’t rotate so for me as the consultant it’s far easier to have some permanent staff in those junior roles that I can rely on. We have junior Drs too but mainly as icing on the cake for their future training and development. In my current outpatient role I don’t have trainee Drs as the role is not considered suitable for training and my life is far far easier just being responsible for my own work now. Sad but true.

ThePure · 15/07/2025 13:37

Just got the shout out from our Trust for consultants to cover the strike days
Consultant and SAS Dr leave is ‘frozen’ on strike days. No more can be requested and they will be reviewing what is already allocated and asking people to volunteer to swap dates
They are offering to pay 2 consultants £178 an hour to cover the 12hr night shifts (lower rates for days and evenings) every day for the duration. You can see how this will bankrupt the NHS now right?
Even this is probably not enough to tempt me to do it after the last time as I was exhausted and a huge chunk of it got clawed back in tax anyhow. I will wait to see who else volunteers and if they are really stuck I will do a bit but I am not going to put myself out as much as last time.

Everanewbie · 15/07/2025 14:11

ThePure · 15/07/2025 13:37

Just got the shout out from our Trust for consultants to cover the strike days
Consultant and SAS Dr leave is ‘frozen’ on strike days. No more can be requested and they will be reviewing what is already allocated and asking people to volunteer to swap dates
They are offering to pay 2 consultants £178 an hour to cover the 12hr night shifts (lower rates for days and evenings) every day for the duration. You can see how this will bankrupt the NHS now right?
Even this is probably not enough to tempt me to do it after the last time as I was exhausted and a huge chunk of it got clawed back in tax anyhow. I will wait to see who else volunteers and if they are really stuck I will do a bit but I am not going to put myself out as much as last time.

Sounds like a nice earner for the consultants, but not sure its worth their while when you're just being hammered by the 60% tax trap.

DryDay · 15/07/2025 14:15

Lots of young doctors I know cannot afford to strike any more.

justasking111 · 15/07/2025 14:20

ThePure · 15/07/2025 13:37

Just got the shout out from our Trust for consultants to cover the strike days
Consultant and SAS Dr leave is ‘frozen’ on strike days. No more can be requested and they will be reviewing what is already allocated and asking people to volunteer to swap dates
They are offering to pay 2 consultants £178 an hour to cover the 12hr night shifts (lower rates for days and evenings) every day for the duration. You can see how this will bankrupt the NHS now right?
Even this is probably not enough to tempt me to do it after the last time as I was exhausted and a huge chunk of it got clawed back in tax anyhow. I will wait to see who else volunteers and if they are really stuck I will do a bit but I am not going to put myself out as much as last time.

My consultant doing part-time private work charges £300 for 15 minutes. Is their private sector work now blocked @ThePure ?

justasking111 · 15/07/2025 14:26

DryDay · 15/07/2025 14:15

Lots of young doctors I know cannot afford to strike any more.

Last time round my friends son was striking as a junior doctor these parents were in a position to supplement him financially. His girlfriend parents Ditto. He was all over social media explaining the ins and outs.

This time not a word from either of them.

I darent ask if the bank of mum and dad are coughing up again.

BIossomtoes · 15/07/2025 15:22

Everanewbie · 15/07/2025 14:11

Sounds like a nice earner for the consultants, but not sure its worth their while when you're just being hammered by the 60% tax trap.

40% of £178 an hour is better than 100% of nothing as I’m sure the striking doctors would agree.

ThePure · 15/07/2025 15:32

justasking111 · 15/07/2025 14:20

My consultant doing part-time private work charges £300 for 15 minutes. Is their private sector work now blocked @ThePure ?

I don’t think Trusts would have the power to do that. Private work is undertaken in your own time (I do not do any on moral grounds)

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