The latest BMA Resident Doctor strike has ended.
This round of industrial action lasted from 7am on 7 April until 6:59am on 13 April.
The UKRDC voted to reject the latest pay offer from the government when it became clear in negotiations that the money proposed for pay increases was now going to be spread over three years. This was on top of the pay review body (DDRB) recommendation of a pay uplift of 3.5 per cent.
Following the strike, Wes Streeting, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, said: "I want to personally thank all the NHS staff who once again worked round the clock during the BMA’s latest round of strikes to keep the show on the road.
"One of the things I am proud of is during previous rounds of resident doctors strikes we’ve maintained 95% of planned care, improvements in A&E and emergency response times. However, I wish we were not putting so much on the shoulders of other NHS staff or spending £300 million on this strike.
"That money would have been better spent implementing this offer to improve resident doctors’ pay and career opportunities."
He added: "My door is open - as it always has been. I am asking the resident doctors’ committee to meet me so we can resolve this dispute and put an end to these needless cycles of disruption."
Ahead of the strike, UK BMA resident doctors committee chair Jack Fletcher said: "We have been negotiating in good faith for weeks to try and end the simultaneous pay and jobs crises for resident doctors. Frustratingly we had been making good progress right up until the point, in the last two weeks, when the Government began to shift the goalposts.
"As talks progressed it became clear that the money proposed for pay increases was now going to be spread over three years. This is combined with today’s pay review body recommendation pointing to yet more years in which our pay, at best, barely treads water.
"We have made abundantly clear throughout this dispute that our aim is pay restoration, and any deal that did not move us substantially in that direction was not going to fly."
