So... who's supporting the Junior Doctor strike?

[The ghost of Michael Theoklitos 0]

[quote user="Buh"]Never seen a skint doctor[/quote]I can introduce you to a few.Well, maybe not skint - but certainly very firmly in the ''working family'' bracket that politicians like to pander to (and then do nothing for).

[The gut 0]

Those nearly skint doctors must be chuffed with their 13.5% pay rise on their basic salary.

[canarydan23 4,060]

The new contract is cost neutral. Work that one out.

Let me know if you need a hand.

[Katie Borkins 1]

Quite amusing we are having this debate on a football message board where the club we support pays players upwards of £30,000 a week for probably 30 hours hard graft.

Whereas some highly skilled and motivated professionals with the ability to save or at least improve lives are being labelled "greedy" because they have legitimate concerns regarding working practices and conditions.

I don''t believe doctors would be striking without very careful thought and things must be beyond desperate to have reached this point.  That should tell you all you need to know about the state of the NHS in the minds of those who are working on the front line.

[Van wink 2,994]

Doesn''t the contract provide for a lower maximum number of hours worked per week, with cost neutrality that looks like a probable pay rise to me.🤔

[The gut 0]

A hand could be useful Dan, especially as you have so much time spare. I had forgotten about the cost neutral statement. So it''s less hours for same then?

If you have any insight though Dan perhaps you could explain the exact complaint of the jd is just because they do not want unsociable hours rostered in?

[? 0]

[quote user="Katie Borkins"]Quite amusing we are having this debate on a football message board where the club we support pays players upwards of £30,000 a week for probably 30 hours hard graft.

Whereas some highly skilled and motivated professionals with the ability to save or at least improve lives are being labelled "greedy" because they have legitimate concerns regarding working practices and conditions.

I don''t believe doctors would be striking without very careful thought and things must be beyond desperate to have reached this point.  That should tell you all you need to know about the state of the NHS in the minds of those who are working on the front line.

[/quote]

Hear hear Bor, spot on! 👍👍

[king canary 7,580]

@Paul

Here is the thing though- most people don''t. Some people work longer by choice, some by necessity that doesn''t mean everyone has to, especially not when working stupidly long hours could endanger someones life.

[paul moy 235]

Vote OUT of the EU to reduce the burden on the NHS and thus junior doctors by 300K net migrants a year into the UK. It would also increase the quality of care to the remaining patients.

It sure makes sense to me.

[The gut 0]

I just saw an interview with a jd who is going to resign. He mentions nothing of the details of the new contract, only of the current state and patient safety. If this is their main concern why are they linking it to the new contract. Makes no sense.

I cannot help smell a rat. They are highly intelligent and respected people but make no logical explanation of their complaint. I would be happy to support them but I do not understand their issue.

[ricardo 7,348]

Much emotive nonsense being spouted on this subject.The facts are that the government have tried to honour a manifesto commitment for a 7 day NHS. In doing so they have offered the Junior doctors a 13.5% rise and a new shift rosta that will allow most of Saturday to be paid at normal rates instead of attracting enhanced overtime rates. It has absolutely nothing to do with forcing doctors to work longer hours etc etc. From what I can see of the deal that has been offered, it looks like a pretty fair compromise. The sticking point doesn''t seem to be the wages but the doctors would like to keep their option of overtime at enhanced rates. Well, wouldn''t we all?Quite understandably many doctors would prefer to retain a normal  week and the enhanced rates for weekends. However as most of us who work or have worked in the private sector know, this advantage is now a thing of the past. Due to globalisation many of us lost such things as double time, call money etc more than a decade ago. We accepted the loss of enhanced rates and the imposition of seven day working patterns in a bid to keep our jobs in the face of competition from low wage economies in Asia. On balance its better to have a job than to not have one and I would say that it will be very difficult for doctors to convince me that they should keep their enhancements when the very people who pay their wages through taxation have lost theirs.Looking at the news clips of the striking doctors the thing that is very apparent is the feminisation of that profession. Again it should come as no surprise that women find weekend working has a detrimental affect on family life and seem far less inclined than men to work overtime. This makes it even more imperative that seven day working needs to be part of the working week. At the end of the day a way has to be found to provide us as patients with seven day cover that doesn''t break the back of NHS finances.Nobody cared when we lost our overtime rates and had unsocial working patterns imposed upon us but then we never had the ability to tug on peoples heartstrings in the way that health service workers do.

[paul moy 235]

Spot on Ricardo.

They also have public sector final salary pension schemes that the majority in the private sector can only dream of after Gordon Brown''s 1997 dividend credit fiasco.

[morty 0]

[quote user="ricardo"]Much emotive nonsense being spouted on this subject.The facts are that the government have tried to honour a manifesto commitment for a 7 day NHS. In doing so they have offered the Junior doctors a 13.5% rise and a new shift rosta that will allow most of Saturday to be paid at normal rates instead of attracting enhanced overtime rates. It has absolutely nothing to do with forcing doctors to work longer hours etc etc. From what I can see of the deal that has been offered, it looks like a pretty fair compromise. The sticking point doesn''t seem to be the wages but the doctors would like to keep their option of overtime at enhanced rates. Well, wouldn''t we all?Quite understandably many doctors would prefer to retain a normal  week and the enhanced rates for weekends. However as most of us who work or have worked in the private sector know, this advantage is now a thing of the past. Due to globalisation many of us lost such things as double time, call money etc more than a decade ago. We accepted the loss of enhanced rates and the imposition of seven day working patterns in a bid to keep our jobs in the face of competition from low wage economies in Asia. On balance its better to have a job than to not have one and I would say that it will be very difficult for doctors to convince me that they should keep their enhancements when the very people who pay their wages through taxation have lost theirs.Looking at the news clips of the striking doctors the thing that is very apparent is the feminisation of that profession. Again it should come as no surprise that women find weekend working has a detrimental affect on family life and seem far less inclined than men to work overtime. This makes it even more imperative that seven day working needs to be part of the working week. At the end of the day a way has to be found to provide us as patients with seven day cover that doesn''t break the back of NHS finances.Nobody cared when we lost our overtime rates and had unsocial working patterns imposed upon us but then we never had the ability to tug on peoples heartstrings in the way that health service workers do.

[/quote][Y][Y][Y]

[The gut 0]

Very well put Ricardo. I think you''re spot on too.

I am not hearing an understandable argument to think otherwise.

[hogesar 9,618]

[quote user="Vanwink"]hogesar wrote the following post at 25/04/2016 12:25 PM:

Kind of get the feeling we''re in for a Walking Dead like Zombie Apocalypse on strike day. And there''ll be no junior doctors to treat us.

No treatment available for that one 😄[/quote]

Come on Vanwink, take this thread seriously please.

[canarydan23 4,060]

"In doing so they have offered the Junior doctors a 13.5% rise"

Look beyond the rhetoric. Unless you too believe the Telegraph is a credible source how do you marry the 13.5% payrise with the fact that the new contract is cost neutral?

The issues have been affecting Junior Doctors for years. The contact is essentially the straw. The NHS has been depending on Junior Doctors working longer than their contracted hours for years and even before the contract debacle imposed by the most incompetent politician in history (and by gosh there have been a few) record numbers were leaving and applying for jobs abroad.

The BMA has asked to limit the number of nights per week a doctor can be on-call and a day off either side of a night-shift before starting back on a daytime pattern. Pretty sensible, huh? Jeremy See You Next Tuesday doesn''t seem to agree. He also wants to restrict breaks to one half-hour slot for a 10-hour shift.

I get more than that in a 7 hour shift sat at a desk.

These people spend 7 years in training. 7 years. They pay for a lot of their equipment as well as the glut of mandatory examinations they sit. They have also aced their A-Levels and were generally in the top few percent of their classes at their respective schools. Similarly high-flying academics will have pursued careers in law or got onto coveted graduate schemes for big companies.

7 years after leaving school at 18, what do you think these people will be earning? A law-graduate who has passed his bar training and has three years experience as a barrister? Easily benefiting from the cut in the top-rate of tax. A graduate who bagged himself a spot on the Aviva graduate scheme and has now been at the company for four years? No child benefit for that £40k plus earner!

A junior doctor 7 years after A-Levels? Probably around £30k. If it was money that motivated these people there are far, far more lucrative careers that individuals of their intelligence and academic achievement can and do pursue.

As far as I can see it, the arguments against are, "Well, things are sh*t for me so why can''t they be sh*t for the junior doctors as well?"

[cornish sam 947]

As Dan says, this is a straw to break a back. The doctors aren''t against a change in working practices, it''s not like they want a greater proportion of people to suffer just because they have the misfortune of being admitted on a weekend. The issue is specifically that this contract does not provide anything towards the stated aims of improving the NHS.

If it was just about junior doctors wanting better money then why would they being supported by all other members of the BMA? The NHS does need to change, 6hr waiting times at an a&e are in no way acceptable, this contract won''t do anything to change that though, it will make a bad situation worse by reducing the number of people getting into the profession to alleviate the issues that are already there.

And Ricardo, Morty, etc (myself included) part of the reason the private sector employees have lost all of the benefits like OT pay is due to us having denuded unions and poorly run/greedy corporations putting shareholders above their workers, if we had strong and protected unions then those rights wouldn''t have been taken away over the last 20 years. Also, if your job is actually a life and death matter then you deserve to be treated better in my opinion.

[TCCANARY 263]

[quote user="ricardo"]Much emotive nonsense being spouted on this subject.

The facts are that the government have tried to honour a manifesto commitment for a 7 day NHS. In doing so they have offered the Junior doctors a 13.5% rise and a new shift rosta that will allow most of Saturday to be paid at normal rates instead of attracting enhanced overtime rates. It has absolutely nothing to do with forcing doctors to work longer hours etc etc. From what I can see of the deal that has been offered, it looks like a pretty fair compromise. The sticking point doesn''t seem to be the wages but the doctors would like to keep their option of overtime at enhanced rates. Well, wouldn''t we all?

Quite understandably many doctors would prefer to retain a normal  week and the enhanced rates for weekends. However as most of us who work or have worked in the private sector know, this advantage is now a thing of the past. Due to globalisation many of us lost such things as double time, call money etc more than a decade ago. We accepted the loss of enhanced rates and the imposition of seven day working patterns in a bid to keep our jobs in the face of competition from low wage economies in Asia. On balance its better to have a job than to not have one and I would say that it will be very difficult for doctors to convince me that they should keep their enhancements when the very people who pay their wages through taxation have lost theirs.

Looking at the news clips of the striking doctors the thing that is very apparent is the feminisation of that profession. Again it should come as no surprise that women find weekend working has a detrimental affect on family life and seem far less inclined than men to work overtime. This makes it even more imperative that seven day working needs to be part of the working week. At the end of the day a way has to be found to provide us as patients with seven day cover that doesn''t break the back of NHS finances.

Nobody cared when we lost our overtime rates and had unsocial working patterns imposed upon us but then we never had the ability to tug on peoples heartstrings in the way that health service workers do.


[/quote]

 

Lovely old sexist generalising there, them wimmin, there all the same, aren''t they? If it wasn''t for there curves and coquettish giggles they would be worth bothering with. [:)]

 

 

[canarydan23 4,060]

Exactly. No offence but people who have saved my son''s life deserve to be treated better than people working in the private sector whose main objective is to make the shareholders richer.

And I speak as someone in the private sector whose main objective is to make the shareholders richer.

And the weekend statistics that Hunt is relying on have been wholly discredited. He is waging this war on the junior doctors on the back of deliberately misinterpreted data at best, Tony Blair Iraq dossier style manipulated information at worse.

The problems in the NHS are all down to a lack of funding. We spend less of our GDP as a percentage on the health service as a significant portion of developed nations. In terms of our performance we actually punch above our weight in terms of the health offering we provide our citizens and that is, in no small amount, down to our dedicated Junior Doctors.

Just because Thatcher did not decimate the BMA like she did the majority of private-sector unions, and just because you have to accept poor working conditions in your job, does not mean that people who save lives on a daily basis should meekly surrender to the whims of an unqualified moron who believes good medicine if f*cking homeopathy.

[Buh 0]

Go and have a look in the junior doctors car park.

I''m not even saying its monetary related, but it''s definitely politically motivated.

im not political either way, just sick of the games both sides play its total b0llocks.

[The gut 0]

Are we reading different information Dan?

I''m reading the new contract 2016 (NHS employers version).

2 X 30 min breaks for shifts over 9hrs. I also remember reading the same on the employee version (which oddly I can no longer access).

[The ghost of Michael Theoklitos 0]

[quote user="Buh"]Go and have a look in the junior doctors car park.

I''m not even saying its monetary related, but it''s definitely politically motivated.

im not political either way, just sick of the games both sides play its total b0llocks.[/quote]Jnr Doctors have their own dedicated car parks now? Is that so they don''t dint the cars of the consultants?

[TCCANARY 263]

[quote user="Buh"]Go and have a look in the junior doctors car park. I''m not even saying its monetary related, but it''s definitely politically motivated. im not political either way, just sick of the games both sides play its total b0llocks.[/quote]

 

Please can you explain what connection you are making between cars and political motivation?

 

 

[ricardo 7,348]

[quote user="canarydan23"]"In doing so they have offered the Junior doctors a 13.5% rise"

Look beyond the rhetoric. Unless you too believe the Telegraph is a credible source how do you marry the 13.5% payrise with the fact that the new contract is cost neutral?

Simple, because everyone doing the new shift pattern will get the 13.5% rise while those that did it as overtime in the past will no longer get the enhanced rate. Many didn''t work Saturday but will now find it part of their rostered pattern. This is exactly what happened to most of us who worked in industry.

The issues have been affecting Junior Doctors for years. The contact is essentially the straw. The NHS has been depending on Junior Doctors working longer than their contracted hours for years and even before the contract debacle imposed by the most incompetent politician in history (and by gosh there have been a few) record numbers were leaving and applying for jobs abroad.

The BMA has asked to limit the number of nights per week a doctor can be on-call and a day off either side of a night-shift before starting back on a daytime pattern. Pretty sensible, huh? Jeremy See You Next Tuesday doesn''t seem to agree. I have many times finished a night shift at 7am and been back on day shift at 7am the following morning. There''s nothing very unusual about it and very common for people working on continuous processes in industry. Yes its tiring but its part of the Continental shift pattern.He also wants to restrict breaks to one half-hour slot for a 10-hour shift.I used to get half an hour in a 12 hour shift. I get more than that in a 7 hour shift sat at a desk.

These people spend 7 years in training. 7 years. They pay for a lot of their equipment as well as the glut of mandatory examinations they sit. They have also aced their A-Levels and were generally in the top few percent of their classes at their respective schools. Similarly high-flying academics will have pursued careers in law or got onto coveted graduate schemes for big companies.

7 years after leaving school at 18, what do you think these people will be earning? A law-graduate who has passed his bar training and has three years experience as a barrister? Easily benefiting from the cut in the top-rate of tax. A graduate who bagged himself a spot on the Aviva graduate scheme and has now been at the company for four years? No child benefit for that £40k plus earner!

A junior doctor 7 years after A-Levels? Probably around £30k. If it was money that motivated these people there are far, far more lucrative careers that individuals of their intelligence and academic achievement can and do pursue.

As far as I can see it, the arguments against are, "Well, things are sh*t for me so why can''t they be sh*t for the junior doctors as well?"[/quote]I don''t think anybody is arguing that money and conditions should be shit for somebody else. We all do the best we can in whatever career we choose to pursue. The point I am making is that most people know what the remuneration will be in the sphere they choose to work in so its a bit disingenuous to moan about afterwards. We all fight to keep whatever gains we have collectively made but in the end we have to accept that we can only have the public services that we are prepared to pay for in our taxes. We have all seen where Gordon Browns "only borrowing to invest" has led us.If the doctors think they can force a better deal than that is entirely their prerogative but in the present economic climate they seem unlikely to do much better than the deal on offer. 

[ricardo 7,348]

[quote user="TCCANARY"]

 

Lovely old sexist generalising there, them wimmin, there all the same, aren''t they? If it wasn''t for there curves and coquettish giggles they would be worth bothering with. [:)]

 

 

[/quote]It has nothing to do with sexism its just the new reality. Many of the female doctors at my practice are married women with families and who can blame them that a lot of them only want to work part time. I certainly don''t but to pretend it is not going to be a problem for the patient is simply deluding yourself. How we overcome the problem is a question that needs debate but lets not pretend that we don''t have a problem.

[nutty nigel 7,513]

I''ve got a red car. Read into that what you will...

[ricardo 7,348]

[quote user="cornish sam"]

And Ricardo, Morty, etc (myself included) part of the reason the private sector employees have lost all of the benefits like OT pay is due to us having denuded unions and poorly run/greedy corporations putting shareholders above their workers, if we had strong and protected unions then those rights wouldn''t have been taken away over the last 20 years. Also, if your job is actually a life and death matter then you deserve to be treated better in my opinion.[/quote]You seem to have omitted the fact that had we dug our heels in and refused to budge, the companies we worked for would have closed down long before they did. It''s nice to pretend that economics don''t matter but in the real world if you can''t sell your product at a price buyers are prepared to pay then you go out of business. Look at the Coal industry, ship building, steel making etc etc, no matter how strong your unions are they can''t give a job for life and a comfortable wage and pension when you retire.

[Van wink 2,994]

The facts of Ricardos post are correct, I''m not taking about the female parts( if you will excuse the term) but the contract issues.

As said previously I have yet to hear a cogent argument from a junior doctor or their reps specifically addressing the the problems of the new contract. The dialogue is hidden in a more generic dialogue about safety and privatisation of the nhs.

This is possibly the right fight but being faught on the wrong battle field and the junior doctors are being used as cannon fodder.

[ricardo 7,348]

[quote user="nutty nigel"]I''ve got a red car. Read into that what you will...[/quote]Is it ex Royal Mail?

[Indy 3,286]

[quote user="nutty nigel"]I''ve got a red car. Read into that what you will...[/quote]

I knew you supported Liverpool! You''re just on here for a wind up! Aye aye calm down!