Junior Doctors: Industrial Action

Debate between Kirsty Blackman and Ben Gummer

Thursday 24th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Ben Gummer]

My right hon. Friend raises an important point. I believe that the legality of the action is correct and that the BMA is within its rights to do as it is doing, but that does not change whether it is right or wrong. Many junior doctors who may have supported the BMA in the withdrawal of elective care will be profoundly worried about that escalation.

[Kirsty Blackman (Aberdeen North) (SNP)]

It is disappointing that, as both the Minister and the shadow Minister pointed out, negotiations are not currently ongoing. Junior doctors are rightly concerned. The Secretary of State has promised that more junior doctors will work at weekends, while, at the same time, no fewer will work during the week. The UK Government decided this week that the best way to reform disability welfare payments is to listen to disabled people. Will the UK Government now make a similar U-turn on NHS reform and concede that the best way to reform the junior doctors contract is to listen to junior doctors?

[Ben Gummer]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question, but I suggest that listening to junior doctors on their need to have a better work-life balance, to ensure that the contract is safer for patients and to address their legitimate complaints about the way the existing contract works is significantly different from listening to the junior doctors committee, whose actions seem to have ulterior motives. All I would say is that we have listened consistently to the concerns of junior doctors both through the negotiators they have appointed and in relation to those they have raised on the ground. That is why we have come to an agreement on 90% of the contract.

Many of the issues settled within the contract were not requested by the BMA. For instance, one of the complaints made by junior doctors for many years is the fact that they have to book leave so far in advance that they often have to miss important family events. We sought to change that, and we did so in the new contract of our own accord. It is one of myriad changes that will make this contract better for junior doctors. That is why the sooner they have it in front of them—we are working very hard to make sure that happens soon—the sooner they will see that this contract is better for them and that they have been misled.