Dare Babalola
The British Medical Association (BMA) has declared a five-day strike following a failed talk with the Labour government for a new pay increase.
The industrial action commenced early Friday as doctors were out on picket lines outside hospitals after negotiations with the government late Thursday didn’t yield a positive result.
The move comes after the doctors accepted a pay rise offer totalling 22.3 percent over two years in September, soon after Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour party took power.
They stated that they had no choice than to embark on the strike again to reverse “pay erosion” since 2008.
“We’re not working 21 percent less hard so why should our pay suffer?” co-chairs of the BMA’s resident doctors committee Melissa Ryan and Ross Nieuwoudt said in a statement.
Earlier, Starmer pleaded with the doctors not to go on strike, stressing the danger of the industrial action.
The Times quoted the Prime Minister of saying that launching a strike put the lives of patients at risk and it could “cause real damage”.
He appealed to the doctors not to “follow” their union, the British Medical Association (BMA) “down this damaging road. Our NHS and your patients need you” .
“Lives will be blighted by this decision,” Starmer warned.
