Doctors in England to go on five-day strike next month over pay and jobs

Resident doctors in England will go on strike next month, the British Medical Association (BMA) has said.

The five-day strike, which will take place between 14 and 19 November, is part of escalating industrial action over jobs and pay.

Resident doctors, previously called junior doctors, make up around half of all doctors in the NHS.

Dr Jack Fletcher, chair of the BMA's resident doctors committee, has called on Health Secretary Wes Streeting to "come forward with a proper offer on jobs, on pay".

"This is not where we wanted to be," said Dr Fletcher.

"We have spent the last week in talks with government, pressing the health secretary to end the scandal of doctors going unemployed.

"We know from our own survey half of second year doctors in England are struggling to find jobs, their skills going to waste whilst millions of patients wait endlessly for treatment, and shifts in hospitals go unfilled. This is a situation which cannot go on."

Dr Fletcher said that while the BMA wanted "to get a deal done, the government seemingly does not", something he said was leaving doctors with "little option but to call for strike action".

"Wes Streeting inherited an NHS falling apart through decades of underinvestment, but restoring our pay over several years, along with concrete plans to create more jobs and training places, would go a long way towards the start of a new and better health service," he added.

Wes Streeting's reaction

Mr Streeting issued a strongly worded response to what he described as a "damaging" strike.

"It is preposterous that the BMA have rushed headlong into more damaging strike action a week after its new leadership opened discussions with the government," said Mr Streeting.

"I urge the BMA to call off these needless strikes, and come back to the table. They have a government that wants to work with them to improve the working lives of resident doctors, and create an NHS fit for the future."

Read more:
First-year doctors vote to strike
NHS figures reveal impact of strike

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has criticised the strike. She said her party would ban industrial action by doctors.

Ms Badenoch said: "They should not be going on strike. Conservative policy is to ban strikes by doctors in the same way the police and the Army cannot go on strike.

"We need to have adequate levels of healthcare. We had legislation that would provide minimum service levels, Labour scrapped it."

Daniel Elkeles, chief executive of NHS Providers, said: "Another strike by resident doctors is the last thing the NHS needs, particularly as we head into what's going to be another challenging winter for the health service.

"Trust leaders will do everything they can to prepare for this five-day walkout, but once again it'll be patients that will be left paying the price."

Resident doctors also staged a five-day walkout in July.

The BMA has argued that pay has declined significantly since 2008, and is calling for a rise of 29.2% to reverse "pay erosion".

(c) Sky News 2025: Doctors in England to go on five-day strike next month over pay and jobs