Up to 60,000 operations are at risk of cancellation or delay every day junior doctors are on strike during planned industrial action next month, health minister Alistair Burt told MPs in an urgent question in the House of Commons.
Burt described the three strikes over weekend working as “entirely avoidable” and urged the British Medical Association to avoid anything that risks harm to patients.
He insisted the health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, had not ruled out mediation through the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (Acas), as requested by the BMA. But he said there was no point going to Acas at this point since negotiations had not broken down, arguing they had not properly started.
The government reserves the right to change doctors’ contracts if an agreement cannot be reached to facilitate the “truly” seven-day NHS promised by the Tories during the general election.
Burt told MPs: “The secretary of state has said that talks can take place without preconditions other than that an agreement should be within the pay envelope, but the government reserves the right to make changes to contracts if no progress is made on the issues preventing a truly seven-day NHS, as promised in the manifesto and endorsed by the British people at the last election.”
The shadow health secretary, Heidi Alexander, said the situation made her “angry and sad”, adding: “It didn’t have to be this way.”
Burt called for all sides to avoid the language of conflict and to avoid the sense that this had become an industrial dispute. As far as the public was concerned, this was not an industrial dispute, he said.
He claimed the BMA had arbitrarily ended the talks and said it should act today to rejoin talks, rather than waiting for the strikes.
Hunt did not go to the Commons as he was in Department of Health holding meetings on contingency plans for the strike, as well as looking at the final funding settlement for the health department in next week’s autumn spending review.
.png?w=600)
