Wes Streeting has failed in an attempt to end the long-running resident doctors’ dispute with a new offer to them, which means their five-day strike next week is expected to go ahead.
The health secretary tabled a new offer to resident doctors – formerly junior doctors – in England on Wednesday in a move intended to avoid the strike, their 13th.
But the British Medical Association’s resident doctors committee (RDC) rejected Streeting’s attempted olive branch and said his proposal was too limited for them to call off their action.
Streeting pledged to double his previous offer to create 1,000 extra places for early-career doctors to move into specialist training in their chosen branch of medicine. Half of those 2,000 would be made available this year to help tackle a bottleneck in resident doctors becoming specialists, he said.
In addition, the NHS would put more money in the pockets of resident doctors by paying fees for exams they take and membership of professional bodies they belong to.
However, Streeting ruled out increasing their pay any further in 2025-26, citing the straitened public finances and the 28.9% pay rise they have had since 2023 to explain his inability to do so. The bulk of that rise has come since Labour took office in July 2024.
But Dr Jack Fletcher, the chair of the RDC, rebuffed Streeting’s offer and said it would still leave far too many doctors unable to progress their careers and in effect jobless.
“This does not go far enough,” he said. “Even with this offer, thousands of doctors would still be unable to find a job. Thirty thousand doctors applied for 10,000 [training] places this year – [so] 1,000 more is not going to fix this crisis, nor come anywhere near doing so.
“Whatever else is true of this offer, Mr Streeting is still not facing up to the gravity of the situation: doctors facing unemployment while patients can’t see a doctor.”
He urged Streeting to offer resident doctors a multi-year pay deal that would lead them to restore over time the significant loss in value of their salaries since 2006, though he did not specify the 29% rise the BMA is seeking. The 2.5% rise Streeting has offered for 2026-27 would be another real-terms pay cut, he added.
“Strikes can still be avoided but first there will need willingness to offer a pay deal and a genuine solution on jobs,” Fletcher said.
