Junior Doctors’ Contract Negotiations Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department of Health and Social Care
Andrew Murrison
Main Page: Andrew Murrison (Conservative - South West Wiltshire)Department Debates - View all Andrew Murrison's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
Junior Doctors’ Contract Negotiations
Andrew Murrison Excerpts(8 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
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Ben Gummer
The hon. Gentleman has long prized himself as a champion of working people, yet the current contract and the proposed contract by the BMA, which I presume the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford) supports, prefers junior doctors over porters, cleaners and junior nurses, and it gives them better rates of pay, and premium rates that could not be enjoyed by lesser paid workers under contracts negotiated by unions that the hon. Gentleman supports. Here we have it: the final morphing of the Labour party into a party that prefers professionals over porters. That, I am afraid, is the party that he is now a member of.
Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)
I very much support the Government’s stance on junior doctors, while acknowledging that most doctors—junior and senior—work well beyond their contracted hours. Does the Minister agree that it is not junior doctors but their seniors, and seniors’ terms and conditions, who really set the tempo in our national health service?
Ben Gummer
My hon. Friend also speaks from experience. We have said right from the beginning that reform of consultants’ and junior doctors’ contracts will be critical in delivering seven-day services. On consultants’ contracts, it is important to make sure that consultants are providing clinical cover over weekends, not just for the benefit of patients but for juniors, who are often covering rotas without clinical cover from consultants with and to whom they might wish to confer and refer.