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‘Surge’ in junior doctors joining BMA after contracts row

There has been a ‘surge’ in junior doctors joining the British Medical Association (BMA) following the heated row over changes to contracts. 

In the week after the BMA’s junior doctor committee took the decision to ballot its members in England over the government’s action to impose a new contract from August 2016, more than 5,400 members – the majority of whom are junior doctors – have joined the union. 

This brings the total membership to just under 160,000. 

Dr Johann Malawana, BMA junior doctor committee chair, who Jeremy Hunt invited to a meeting to discuss the proposed changes to the junior doctors’ contracts, said: “The unprecedented number of doctors joining the BMA and the thousands who have attended rallies across England is clear evidence of the anger and frustration felt by junior doctors. 

“Until the government lifts the threat of contract imposition and gives the BMA the concrete assurances we require we will continue with the action junior doctors are demanding. The time is well overdue for Ministers to listen to what junior doctors are telling them.” 

Earlier this week, former health minister Dr Dan Poulter, who was involved with discussions over the contracts last year, said that Hunt had triggered “understandable” anger by going back on a deal that had originally been discussed. 

Writing in the Guardian, Dr Poulter claimed: “The junior doctor contract that has emerged over the summer – the contract that the Department of Health now wants to impose – is very different from the one being discussed this time last year. Then there was no talk of 90-hour weeks, no talk of large numbers of junior doctors having their pay cut. 

“There was instead a recognition by the Department of Health that now appears to have been lost: that better pay and work-life balance incentives were needed to ensure doctors were attracted to A&E and other gruelling specialities. Now we are seeing junior doctors, for the first time ever, balloting for strike action over their contract of employment.” 

But a Department of Health spokesman said that these claims are “incorrect”. 

“Our proposals will mean average pay will not go down and there is no intention to increase working hours,” said the spokesman. “In fact, we want to offer more safeguards over total hours worked for junior doctors than ever before. We call on the Junior Doctors Committee to re-enter negotiations and work with us to put in place a new contract that's safe for patients and fair for doctors.” 

Last week, thousands of junior doctors took to Downing Street on 28 September to protest against the recent government decision to impose a new contract on them despite widespread opposition to its changes. 

It also came after a warning from the BMA that there would be a mass exodus of trainee doctors resulting from the “outpouring of anger” over the government’s actions. The General Medical Council has already been getting almost 30 times more requests from doctors seeking certificates to work abroad than normal.