Hunt offers junior doctors 11 per cent pay rise in attempt to end contract dispute

The move is part of a package of new initiatives which are intended to persuade England’s 45,000 trainee doctors to vote against strike action at the fast approaching ballot.

It is expected that Hunt will place significant emphasis on the aspect of an 11 per cent pay rise, which is much greater than the previously anticipated one per cent annual rise that public sector workers initially expected over the next years.

Hunt recently pledged that under the new seven day contract, no junior doctor would be worse off. The new intervention comes as the Junior Doctors Committee of the British Medical Association (BMA) prepares to ballots its members about their willingness to take action. A strike would affect a wide range of NHS services, including increasing the risk of cancellation of planned operations and outpatient clinics, particularly in the run up to Christmas.

It is believed that as many as 80-90 per cent of doctors - all those below consultant grade - will vote for strike action, industrial action short of a strike, or both.

In response to Hunt’s new pay rise incentive, some junior doctors have already rejected the offer. Milo Hollingsworth, a junior doctor who works in neurosurgery at the North Bristol NHS Trust, said: “The sugar coating is Hunt will increase base pay by 11 per cent but the bitter pill is the cut on out-of-hours pay. This will result in a net loss of 20 per cent - 30 per cent regardless of his token 11 per cent increase in base pay. Furthermore, they will abolish incremental pay so we get paid lower rates for longer. He has conceded nothing.

“I am paid £27,000 base salary for working 8-5pm Monday to Friday. I am paid a further 50 per cent for working nights, weekends and bank holidays. I have worked every bank holiday of 2015. These changes would see my base pay increased to £29,000 but my out-of-hours pay cut would leave me with a yearly income of £32,000 from next August; £8,000 less than this year.”

In addition, other junior doctors have outlined that an 11 per cent pay rise is below the smallest pay rise, 14.9 per cent, advised by the Doctors and Dentists’ Review Body. The extra pay is proposed as a return earned for working more antisocial hours which is to be reclassified as normal working time.

Hunt is also expected to relent his original plans, which mean doctors would receive basic rates to include all day Saturday from 7am to 10pm. Instead, one option could be that basic pay rates will only apply on Saturday between the hours of 7am to 10pm.

Hunt will also attempt to assuage the concern that forcing juniors to work excessive hours will leave them overworked and potentially a threat patients, by issuing the Care Quality Commission new powers to ensure juniors are not overworking themselves.

Dr Johann Malawana, the BMA Junior Doctors Committee chair, said: “Junior doctors need facts, not piecemeal announcements and we need to see the full detail of this latest, eleventh hour offer to understand what, in reality, it will mean for junior doctors.

“The BMA and junior doctors have been clear that we want to reach a negotiated agreement with the government on a contract that is good for patients, junior doctors and the NHS. In order to do this we have said, repeatedly, that the government must remove the threat of imposition and provide the concrete assurances junior doctors have asked for on a contract that is safe and fair.

“We are clear that without the assurances we require, the BMA will be left with little option but to continue with our plans to ballot members."

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