Resident doctors in England vote in favour of more strike action

Resident doctors in England have voted overwhelmingly to continue their strike action amid ongoing disagreements with the government over pay and the availability of training posts. This decision extends the British Medical Association’s (BMA) mandate to pursue industrial action for another six months, though specific new strike dates have not yet been revealed. The dispute began in spring 2023 and has already resulted in 14 separate strikes.

Following a month of negotiations between the BMA and government officials after their most recent strike just before Christmas, 93% of participating BMA members supported maintaining pressure through further strikes. The turnout for this vote stood at 53%. Dr Jack Fletcher, who leads the BMA’s resident doctor group, expressed that ministers “cannot be shocked” by the strike vote, especially in light of a proposed pay cut recommendation made by the health secretary earlier this year.

The government has offered a 2.5% pay increase starting in April, but this has been met with resistance from the doctors. Dr Fletcher highlighted an ongoing problem surrounding insufficient training opportunities, emphasizing that “without thousands more training posts, the bottlenecks in medical training are going to continue to rob brilliant young doctors of their careers.” He maintained that strikes were not inevitable, acknowledging recent improvements in the government’s tone and approach toward the dispute.

Resident doctors, who represent nearly half of all NHS doctors and were previously known as junior doctors, have received around 30% pay rises over the last three years. However, the BMA argues that when adjusted for inflation, their salaries are still about 20% lower than in 2008. The union also points to a critical shortage of available training positions at the specialty training level, where last year more than 30,000 applicants competed for about 10,000 jobs, some of whom were international doctors. A spokesperson from the Department for Health and Social Care expressed hope that ongoing talks would resolve the strike issue and prevent further disruption within the NHS in 2026

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