Into the abyss - NHS Consultants have voted for strike action

Aveline

BMA delegates voted to restrict the numbers of doctors in training. Selfish and short sighted.

No they didn't ......yawn..................

BMA delegates voted to restrict the numbers of doctors in training. Selfish and short sighted.

Callistemon21

I don't actually think pay for doctors is as good in Australia as we may think and the cost of living is higher too.

Agreed

I don't actually think pay for doctors is as good in Australia as we may think and the cost of living is higher too.

‐-pay. The--
And can then

If middle income is now from £75,000 to £125,000, I don't think they are being unreasonable.

If this seems like too big a jump, the the government could have spread it out over the last 13 years. Only the government has had the power to do this, and they chose not to. Only the government is to blame.

If, as I heard, a doctor can move to Australia and get twice the pay. The can work the same hours as they now working a week but over two weeks there. Double the money for half the hours. If this tempts more, and it is bound to , our hospitals will become even more depleted,. The only people to blame for this will be the government yet again. Who else can it be?

GSM so pleased we have found agreement

Quite so. If anyone simply wants money then they don’t consider a career in medicine. Doctors are valued by society but they should understand from the outset that being valued by society and being paid a lot of money by society are very different things. What society will pay a professional person and what the individual who is paying the bill will pay are entirely different.

Germanshepherdsmum

They are being paid by the taxpayer and they always knew that would be the case unless they were able to move into private healthcare or general practice or move abroad. They don’t however have the freedom to move to another employer that lawyers, accountants and bankers and they knew that from the outset. They made that choice.

Fortunately some talented, academic young people are not completely motivated by money but that doesn't mean they should not be paid properly and as I keep saying, that is why anyone who wants a functioning NHS should support them. GSM, we have been round this loop many times before and we won't agree. We have a desperate shortage of consultants in most of the specialisms and training doctors to consultant level takes years. As the NHS is the only training option in the UK, I want young talented academic people to see becoming a doctor as an interesting, demanding and well paid profession that is valued by society and one that they aspire to if they just want a money and a big house, probably they are not cut out for medicine and should go for something else.

Surely a country rated the firth or sixth richest in the world should be able to train its own doctors?

We have a huge number of well qualified and highly motivated school leavers who want to enter the medical profession,.

We should not be depending on doctors coming here from overseas countries which need them. This is a political failure

www.bma.org.uk/bma-media-centre/bma-says-increased-medical-school-places-are-welcomed-but-funding-must-be-found-for-extra-clinical-placements

Responding to the announcement that extra medical school places will be available this year, Dr Mary Anne Burrow, co-chair of the BMA medical academic staff committee, said:

“We welcome the news that there will be extra funding for medical school places as this desperate need for more doctors in training is a recommendation that we made in our Medical Staffing in England report, which we issued last month.

“However, this increase in student places must not come at the expense of extra funding for the existing workforce or reductions in funding in future years, because tackling the waiting lists and backlog are going to require sustained investment over many years. And the government must make clear that there will be sufficient clinical placements for all those who succeed at medical school.

“We don’t have enough doctors, those that are working are exhausted and burned out. Finding the money to train doctors of the future is therefore essential but must be matched with the right investments in medical educators and clinical placements to ensure that this leads to a sustained increase in the medical workforce.”

They are being paid by the taxpayer and they always knew that would be the case unless they were able to move into private healthcare or general practice or move abroad. They don’t however have the freedom to move to another employer that lawyers, accountants and bankers and they knew that from the outset. They made that choice.

For clarity, the govt may be prepared to fund more places now but they need clinical placements to support that training. That puts additional work and responsibility on existing staff who are already completely over stretched, they can't just put med students on wards inadequately supervised.

Grantanow

The Tories spend some 39% less on the NHS than the Germans spend on their health service and we are consequentially short of doctors who are leaving for Australia and elsewhere for a less-stressful and better paid life.. Bear in mind that government Ministers can earn £84,000 as MPs plus up to about £101,000 (depending on the post) as well as being eligible for significant expenses and allowances. Few of them have worked and studied as hard as hospital consultants for whom it takes about 15 years to achieve the grade and they incur considerable education and training costs and student debt.

Australian healthcare is also having problems. Medicare is underfunded and most people pay into private healthcare schemes.

www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-20/the-history-of-medicare/102232344

There is a huge shortage of medical staff in Australia, that is why they often try to recruit staff from other countries.

Germanshepherdsmum

Indeed ronib, 2017 was six years ago foxie.

Yes and if those training places had been funded we would have many more doctors in current training rather than those new training places training people from overseas.

I do wonder how people training to be lawyers, accountants, bankers etc would react if they were told that by the time they were well trained and shouldering a lot of responsibility they would be paid 35% less than the salary level when they made their career choice. Bright professionals can change their employer if they think they are being underpaid, this is not true of junior doctors, their training can only come via the NHS (unless they move to another country that recognises UK training, most do). This is why it is important for anyone who wants a functioning NHS to support them. They are not being greedy, they are not asking for the huge salaries that are paid in the private sector, they just want to be paid a salary on a par with what they expected to be paid. It's not as though they are taking advantage of the current chronic shortage of doctors but they do recognise that every doctor who leaves places more work and responsibility on them and undermines the level of care that they want to give to their patients.

Indeed ronib, 2017 was six years ago foxie.

foxie48 the Guardian is wrong again. Just google - Bma has voted against increasing medical places!

Germanshepherdsmum

I don’t think it will. The consultants are preventing the training of new doctors in sufficient numbers. Bringing more doctors through the system would take years, but it would lessen the burden on the insufficient number of existing doctors for which the government is being blamed. The government promised more doctors - the consultants said No.

Sorry but that is not true, the govt refused to fund more training places. i posted a link to the Guardian article from 2017 earlier in this thread and have posted it before.

Chocolatelovinggran

Bella, every time that I am in the centre of Cardiff I touch the statue of Nye Bevan and send a thank you up for all the lives touched by the NHS from safe births to managed deaths and every stage in between. This service needs staffing.People with skills we need must be paid. We apply this logic to bankers, I understand.

I've been to the hospital in the slate mines in Snowdonia to see how their care system worked. The men all played into a self-help club and helped each other when injured. Nye Bevin was meant to base his set-up of the NHS on that example. My great-grandfather helped set up something similar in the mining area where he lived.
If I'm honest I'm just glad DH does not have to make the decision whether to strike. Which of us would like to make it? unfortunately, the days of people like Bevan who had everyone's health matters at heart are long gone.

I’m afraid the BMA says No.

What is a decent deal? The 35% they demand ?

Germanshepherdsmum

I don’t think it will. The consultants are preventing the training of new doctors in sufficient numbers. Bringing more doctors through the system would take years, but it would lessen the burden on the insufficient number of existing doctors for which the government is being blamed. The government promised more doctors - the consultants said No.

GSM, now that's a view I've certainly never heard from sis and BiL. Totally and utterly the contrary, its 100% train more doctors!

foxie48

I can't help thinking that this vote is representative of the poor morale of doctors working in the NHS. fwiw consultants on ft contracts working for the NHS cannot exceed private earnings in excess of 10% of their NHS salary, so a consultant on £100K p.a. would earn £110K max. This salary pales into insignificance when compared with many professions, especially when also compared with the years of training required. There are also many specialisms that have few opportunities for private work, paediatrics, obstetrics, geriatrics, spring to mind. Surely doctors have as much right to be properly paid as anyone else? They should also have good working conditions and feel valued so they stay working in the NHS. We are increasingly becoming a country with a two tier health service, poorer people get poor NHS treatment and richer people can go private and get really good treatment. It's beginning to feel like the US!

I think that best represents how I feel.

We need to get more hot under the collar about our struggling NHS then heap opprobrium on a group whom I know (sis and BiL recently retired consultants and not lefties) are as concerned about the NHS as a whole as keeping pace with inflation (and quite rightly looking across at the private sector where the years of training and responsibility are clearly equivalent).

But yes, have more, and remaining, sympathy for junior doctors. They are being treated very eery shabbily and we need them and we are not training enough for the future. FGS, give them a decent deal.

I don’t think it will. The consultants are preventing the training of new doctors in sufficient numbers. Bringing more doctors through the system would take years, but it would lessen the burden on the insufficient number of existing doctors for which the government is being blamed. The government promised more doctors - the consultants said No.