Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
False
News & media
Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
Debate current medical affairs
As I prepare to start a week of night shifts, I stop and wonder what impact the BMA strike may have this week. When tanker drivers threatened a strike over their terms and conditions there was panic b
0
Cat:OffDutyForum:NewsMedia
Cat:OffDutyForum:NewsMediaDiscussion:ba0e3613-c277-4cff-983a-ee954d9208c3
Forums » Off duty » News & media » Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
|
Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
posted at 18/6/2012 1:35 PM BST
on bmj.com
|
Posts: 1351
First: 25/1/2009 Last: 24/5/2013 |
As I prepare to start a week of night shifts, I stop and wonder what impact the BMA strike may have this week. When tanker drivers threatened a strike over their terms and conditions there was panic buying of fuel leading to shortages, and daily media updates with the government keen to negociate and cancel the strike. As I mentioned in a recent discussion it all seems to have gone quiet in terms of negociations from the government in attempt to call off the strikes. Public image Its no suprise that the media's opinion is that of doctors who "dont care" endangering patient lives with their greed. After all, we're all paid far too much dont you know! With the media only selling one side of the story it may take some considerable time to regain the public image. Even my non-medical relatives feel that our actions are unjustifed after reading the BMA side of the story. You can guarentee that the media will be hunting for any medical errors or incidents which may occur to demonstrate how we didn't even maintain safe service. Patient Care According to the government and media we are "endangering lives" and making hospitals "unsafe". What most members of public are not realising is that there will be more doctors in the building than any weekend / bank holiday day, and only those who are BMA members will be striking, everyone else will be working as normal. Therefore the industrial action will cause far less disruption to services than the jubilee bank holiday weekend . Dividing the profession There are a number of doctors in high profile jobs who despite being BMA members have said they will work as usual. Those who chose / are not entitled to strike may feel resentment that they are being left to do the work while those on strike stand at the picket lines. Effect on emergency care services With GP surgeries being shut we can probably anticipate an increase in members of the public seeking A&E / walk-in-centre care and potentially action from daytime inpatient jobs not being done will increase workload on the night teams. But will our industrial action lead to negociation from the government and for a better deal for our pensions? Only time will tell - but from the lack of information in the national media we certainly dont seem to be making moves towards calling off the strike. What difference will Thursday's actions make to me? I'm on the night shift, so I'll be working as usual providing the emergency care which of course is the only work that happens at night (if only) and will review the news on the way home to see if my pension has been saved. |
|
|
Re: Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
posted at 18/6/2012 2:31 PM BST
on bmj.com
|
Posts: 324
First: 23/12/2011 Last: 3/5/2013 |
In Response to Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...: But will our industrial action lead to negociation from the government and for a better deal for our pensions? Only time will tell - but from the lack of information in the national media we certainly dont seem to be making moves towards calling off the strike. What difference will Thursday's actions make to me? Posted by DrS Simple answer- NO Good luck with the night shifts!! I think the post industrial action period will be most interesting. If nothing happens from the givernment what will the BMA do then? Keep on taking action? The words 'flogging' and 'dead horse' spring to mind. :-D |
|
|
Re: Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
posted at 18/6/2012 2:36 PM BST
on bmj.com
|
Posts: 1271
First: 13/4/2010 Last: 23/5/2013 |
Hi DrS - just to clarify there is no intention that GP surgeries will be shut. They will all be open (or at least should be) to deal with on-the-day stuff. All we have done in our surgery is have no prebooked appointments on the 21st for those docs taking part in industrial action and just have on-the-day appointments instead. In effect, the patients will notice little or no difference. From our own perspective I think we have to put our case across as best we can in our local media. I have done an article for my local paper which they have agreed to print uneditied and uncommented. The text is as follows (feel free to cut and paste): On Thursday 21st of June, doctors across Scotland will be taking industrial action for the first time in almost 40 years. It’s important to note this is industrial action – not a strike.The last time doctors took industrial action, it was 1975; the Bay City Rollers were Britain’s most popular band and people were queuing round the block to see Jaws; Harold Wilson was Prime Minister, Charlie Chaplin had been knighted and two new laws had yet to be enacted – the Sex Discrimination Act and the Equal Pay Act.And I was a 10 year old boy dreaming of a career as a country doctor. Thirty-seven years later, however, it is with a heavy heart that I voted for industrial action, but I felt that, like many doctors, I had been forced to take this action to get the Government to listen to us. I had hoped the Government would see sense and return to meaningful talks so that it could be called off. Sadly, this has not happened, so I feel that it is important to explain why we are taking this action and what impact it is likely to have on your experience of the health service.There are a lot of myths out there about GP earnings and it is important to correct those. I don’t earn £100,000 a year or anywhere close to that figure and GPs in Scotland continue to earn 20% less than their colleagues south of the border. In 2004, a new contract was introduced for General Practice because years of erosion of GP earnings had put us into a recruitment and retention crisis. The Government recognised this and wanted to introduce a contract to reverse the situation. The GP contract of 2004 was what the Government offered to GPs – not what we demanded. What that contract did was restore GP earnings, in real terms, to the levels of a decade before. Since then our incomes have fallen again such that they are now back to the kind of levels they were at, in real terms, pre-2004. Now what the Government are effectively saying is “You have a well-paid, secure job and a good pension scheme which we agreed to – you’re greedy”.Our current dispute is essentially about the Government going back on a deal negotiated in good faith only four years ago. At that time, NHS staff agreed major changes to their pension scheme to make it sustainable for the future. We agreed a tiered contribution scheme so that higher earners contributed more to protect lower paid workers. We also agreed an increase in pension age for new entrants. In addition, we agreed that staff – not taxpayers – would take on sole responsibility for any future increases in contributions necessary to cover costs, such as those created by people living longer. Now the government wants to unilaterally tear up that deal. We want them to stick to their end of the bargain. The Government says things have changed since 2008 and that the Hutton Review of public sector pensions said that current pension arrangements are unsustainable. But the NHS pension reforms of 2008 were achieved through negotiation between the Government, NHS employers and health unions and took into account many of the Hutton recommendations on sustainability. A Public Accounts Committee report in 2011 found that the 2008 reforms to NHS pensions were already bringing substantial savings to taxpayers and were sustainable well into the future. Even Lord Hutton himself said “public sector pensions are not gold-plated”.The Government says we are living longer. This is true, but the 2008 reforms ensured that future additional costs of increased longevity would be met by staff, not taxpayers. In addition, tiered contributions were introduced which ensured higher paid NHS staff would pay proportionally more ensuring that lower paid staff would not be subsidising the pensions of higher paid staff. Doctors’ contributions rose immediately from 6% to 8.5% - a relative rise of 42%. Under the new arrangements doctors’ pension contributions will rise to 14.5% (and more for GPs) by April 2014, and doctors will pay 40% tax on the pensions they draw on retirement. NHS staff will pay proportionally more for their pensions than most other public sector workers such that, by 2014, higher paid doctors will be paying in twice as much as a senior civil servant on the same salary in order to get a similar pension. Where will these increased pension contributions from doctors go? Have you heard one single Government minister saying they will be used to bolster the poorer pension payments of other public-sector workers? No? Neither have I. In reality these unnecessary increases are effectively an additional tax on NHS staff to help pay for an economic deficit which they did not create. It is not possible or fair to compare public and private sector pension arrangements. Public sector pensions are calculated on an entirely different formula which has been shown to be economically efficient. If private sector pension arrangements are poor, then surely the Government’s primary goal should be to reform them to make them better. Doctors believe that the proposed changes are unnecessary and unfair. The NHS Pension scheme is not a drain on taxpayers. It currently delivers a surplus of £2 billion to the Treasury each year.Yet this is a Government which says public sector pensions are unaffordable and need to be reformed - the same Government which has excluded from these reforms the pensions of the judiciary and, of course, MPs themselves. It’s also the same Government which spent half a trillion pounds of public money bailing out the banks (much of which was then spent on more bankers’ bonuses) and which also finds it affordable to spend over £50 billion to date in Afghanistan and even more in Iraq. On the day of action, patients can be assured that doctors in hospitals and general practice will be in their usual workplaces but providing urgent and emergency care only.This means that many non-urgent cases will be postponed. Although this will be disruptive to the NHS and to some of you, we will be there when patients need us most and the action will not impact on patient safety.In developing our plans, patient safety remains the overriding priority on the day of action. Doctors in hospitals will only undertake clinical work of an urgent or emergency nature. We have been working with managers locally to plan for the day of action and we will seek to postpone in advance any consultations or routine procedures that can safely be delayed.Care which is not urgent – including many routine operations and appointments – is likely to be postponed to another day, but will not be cancelled altogether. If care cannot be postponed safely, it will not be postponed at all. For example, care will continue to be provided for all new cancer referrals and surgery, emergency department and labour ward attendances. Non-urgent hospital outpatient appointments, elective (non-urgent) surgery such as cataract removal or hernia repair, would be postponed. As part of our discussions with managers in the NHS, we have encouraged them to advise patients as soon as possible if their appointments are being postponed.General Practice surgeries where doctors are taking part in the industrial action will remain open and fully staffed for urgent patients, so they can see patients in need of attention that day. However, in some practices, there may not be any routine, non-urgent appointments available. You do not need to do anything. I would like to reassure you that local doctors’ representatives will work closely with NHS managers to ensure that anyone affected is able to receive as much notice as possible and to have non-urgent appointments rearranged. Anyone who needs urgent care on the day will receive that care. Doctors do not take the decision to take industrial action lightly, but we hope that patients will understand that our taking action is the only way that we can hope that the Government will listen to us.And the public must decide who to trust – allegedly gold-plated doctors or genuinely gold-plated multi-millionaires sitting around the Cabinet table many of whom, at their core, don’t believe in any kind of publically-funded service. |
|
|
Re: Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
posted at 18/6/2012 3:02 PM BST
on bmj.com
|
Posts: 2060
First: 12/3/2010 Last: 24/5/2013 |
Not every journalist is sharpening their pencil so as to stick it into the doctors. Ms.Victoria Cohen has written sympathetically before on our behalf and she does so again in this week's Observer: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/17/victoria-coren-carry-on-doctor Some solace, in a hard world. Thank you, Ms.Cohen! John |
|
|
Re: Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
posted at 26/6/2012 6:22 AM BST
on bmj.com
|
Posts: 61
First: 24/10/2011 Last: 21/5/2013 |
This is after the event, and hindsight is a very good thing, but I think that we did not get our message across. We appeaered to be just complaining about having our pension contributions increased and also working longer to get what is still a "gold plated" pension. We did not accentuate the unfairness that we will be paying a much higher percentage of our salaries than similarly paid senior civil servants. We should also have compared what we are paying/getting with the "platinum plated" pensions of MPs and Cabinet Ministers - who are not going to have to pay more and work longer. I do NOT think we should have any more strikes. We should concentrate on publicing our case - which is a very good one - through the media. |
Forums » Off duty » News & media » Potential effects of the upcoming strikes...
