Senior doctors, known as consultants, began a 48-hour walkout today and will be joined by junior doctors tomorrow. They are due to hold three further days of joint strike action next month.
Doctors have said they will operate Christmas Day levels of service, providing emergency care.
“What we’re announcing today is how we protect time-critical hospital services, so things like chemotherapy, things like dialysis, because we recognise the right to strike is important, but we’ve got to balance that with also the right of patients to key treatments,” health minister Steve Barclay told Sky News.
He said France and Italy already had such measures in place.
The government passed legislation in July that requires striking workers in key sectors such as rail and fire services to provide minimum levels of service during industrial action, but this did not include hospital staff.
The government says around 900,000 appointments in the state-run National Health Service (NHS) have already been cancelled as a result of doctor strikes this year.
‘Fairness’
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has made cutting NHS patient waiting lists one of his five top priorities ahead of a national election expected next year. More than 7.6 million people in the UK are on a waiting list for hospital treatment.
In July, junior doctors were awarded a 6% pay rise and £1,250 pounds for 2023/24, but the British Medical Association (BMA) trade union says they are still facing a pay cut in real terms.
Consultants also received a 6% raise, but the BMA, which represents nearly 200,000 doctors in the UK, said they are seeking a raise above the level of the Retail Price Index inflation, which was 11.4% for the 12 months to April.
“We are simply asking for fairness and are demanding an end to real terms pay cuts and a fair mechanism for this pay loss to be corrected,” Vishal Sharma, chair of the BMA’s consultants committee, said in an open letter to Sunak and Barclay.
But the government does not plan to reopen negotiations.
“In terms of pay for this year, we’ve set a fair and final position,” Barclay told Times Radio.