Health Secretary to meet BMA ahead of planned strike action by resident doctors

Health Secretary Wes Streeting will meet representatives from the British Medical Association (BMA) this week for talks in an effort to avoid planned strike action.

The BMA announced last week that resident doctors – formerly known as junior doctors – in England would walk out for five consecutive days from 7am on July 25 amid a pay dispute with the Government.

The BMA said the discussions will begin negotiations on how this month’s strike can be prevented.

Mr Streeting is reportedly sympathetic to improving working conditions for doctors, but will not budge on salaries.

Reacting to the BMA announcement on Wednesday, Mr Streeting called the move “completely unreasonable” and urged the union to “abandon their rush to strike”, while health chiefs warned strikes are “unfair to patients”.

Mr Streeting told the Commons on Thursday: “We have put the NHS on the road to recovery, but we all know that the NHS is still hanging by a thread, and that the BMA is threatening to pull it.”

TV doctor and IVF pioneer, Professor Robert Winston, resigned from the BMA following the strike announcement, writing in The Times: “I’ve paid my membership for a long time. I feel very strongly that this isn’t the time to be striking.

“I think that the country is really struggling in all sorts of ways, people are struggling in all sorts of ways.

“Strike action completely ignores the vulnerability of people in front of you.”

He urged the union to reconsider, saying it is “important that doctors consider their own responsibility much more seriously”, and stressed that the walkout could cause “long-term damage” to people’s faith in doctors.

Some 90% of voting resident doctors backed the strike action, with the BMA reporting a turnout of 55%.

The union has said that resident doctors need a pay uplift of 29.2% to reverse “pay erosion” since 2008-09.

In September, BMA members voted to accept a government pay deal worth 22.3% on average over two years.

The 2025-26 pay deal saw resident doctors given a 4% uplift plus £750 “on a consolidated basis” – working out as an average pay rise of 5.4%.

The BMA call for a 29.2% uplift is based on Retail Prices Index (RPI) inflation, the measure of average changes in the price of goods and services used by most households.

BMA resident doctors committee co-chairs, Dr Ross Nieuwoudt and Dr Melissa Ryan, said: “We have been clear throughout the dispute that we are happy to continue discussions to find a solution that both our members will find acceptable and that can prevent any strike action having to take place.

“We are glad that the Secretary of State has taken us up on our offer and we look forward to constructive discussions, in the hope that we can make progress that would be sufficient to support suspending the planned strike.”

Published: 13/07/2025 by Radio NewsHub