UK Health Secretary Urges Doctors to Accept Pay Offer After Strike

Health Secretary Wes Streeting urged striking resident doctors in England to accept a government pay offer on Monday, as the latest six-day walkout concluded without resolving the ongoing dispute over salaries and working conditions. The action, which began last Tuesday and ended at 7 a.m., marked the 15th round of industrial action by the British Medical Association's resident doctors committee since 2023, disrupting non-emergency care across hospitals.

The strike stemmed from the BMA's rejection of a proposed deal that included a 4.9 percent average pay rise for the current year, rising to a minimum 9.1 percent uplift by the third year when combined with prior increases. Government officials described the offer as fair, noting resident doctors had received cumulative rises totaling 28.9 percent since Labour took office, leaving them 35.2 percent better off than four years ago. Streeting emphasized the financial strain, stating that full pay restoration to 2008 levels, adjusted for retail price index inflation, would cost the National Health Service £3 billion annually for resident doctors alone and could escalate to £30 billion if extended to nurses, consultants, and other staff.