More than 50,000 NHS doctors started a five-day strike on 17 December. Health Secretary Wes Streeting called them ‘morally reprehensible’. Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the strike was ‘dangerous and utterly irresponsible’. Streeting had the gall to add that the strike might be ‘the Jenga piece’ that collapses the NHS.
Many thousands of NHS staff and trade unionists, on the other hand, hail the strikers as heroes and their action as necessary not just for doctors and their families, but for the future of the NHS.
Smear campaign
The strike began after weeks of misinformation, fake news and manipulated stories about the BMA overriding the concerns of ‘moderate’ doctors. From the government benches to the BBC news desks, we were told time and again that doctors really, deep-down wanted to work, that they haven’t suffered a fall in pay and, to cap it off, that no one liked them.
Politicians and right wing pundits have even weaponised the flu epidemic to insinuate that the British Medical Association was playing with patients’ lives.
To answer the charges levelled against workers who have chosen to save lives, the BMA insists that they are based on half-truths and lies. First the union is not ‘out of step’ with its members. November’s strikes were not less popular with doctors, but more so, with 11% more members taking action than in previous actions.
Secondly, they have not received pay restoration at all. The much trumpeted 28% rise last year fell over a three-year period, when inflation peaked at 11% and added 24% to prices. So in real terms doctors’ pay has increased by 4% over three years, a mere dent in the 29% drop since 2008, when austerity started.
The row over which index to use to measure inflation boils down to whether you include housing costs, rents and mortgages, in the calculation. Unless you expect doctors to sleep rough, the BMA is using the right formula, the Retail Price Index.
Thirdly, it depends who you ask and how well informed they are, when measuring the strikers’ popularity. If people rely on the mainstream media, which is increasingly a right wing echo chamber, they might get the impression that the doctors are evil and selfish. But the 1.5 million other NHS staff and one million care workers overwhelmingly support the BMA doctors’ strike. They know the system is broken and the strike is part of the fix.
Finally on the flu outbreak, the truth is people are dying unnecessarily from this epidemic, just as they did from covid. The number of patients receiving treatment on trollies in corridors has exploded by 6,000% over the past decade. This ongoing crisis was not caused by strike action. It was caused by cuts and privatisation.
Where next?
Streeting made a last minute ‘offer’ to try and avert the action by adding 1,000 more doctors’ jobs next year and 4,000 by 2028, to ease the labour market, which is seeing 20,000 doctors potentially unemployed in the middle of their training. While welcome, 5,000 more jobs in the next three years does not solve the problem of 20,000 doctors seeking work today.
BMA members rightly rejected this ‘offer’ which is simply a promise to make the broken system work a little bit better and does nothing to address the issues behind the strike; 83% voted to continue with their action on a 65% turnout – a huge majority in the face of a massive vilification campaign.
But many of the issues faced by the doctors also affect nurses, ancillary and office staff. Streeting’s private sector reforms will only add to the deterioration. All NHS and care workers need to demand their unions get together and coordinate ballots and strike action in the New Year.
Andrea Egan’s election as Unison’s first left wing General Secretary, and the RCN and Unite already securing consultative ballots in favour of action must offer hope that a united strike to save the NHS can become a reality.
