Resident doctors in England have voted to accept a new government deal on pay and jobs, bringing an end to strike action that has cost the NHS £1bn since last summer.
It comes after the British Medical Association called off a strike at the last minute earlier this month to put the offer to members.
The package includes standard 2016 resident doctor contract terms for all locally employed medics and an average 6.6% pay uplift to be fully implemented by April 2027. There will also be 4,500 extra specialty training places over three years.
The deal means resident doctor pay will be 35.2% higher on average compared with four years ago, the Department of Health and Social Care said.
Dr Jack Fletcher, the chair of the BMA’s resident doctors committee (RDC), said: “Resident doctors have spoken. They have decided that the current offer is sufficient to continue on the road to pay restoration, and sufficient to address the absurd lack of jobs in the NHS. The strikes will now end.”
The first strike by resident – then called junior – doctors began on 13 March 2023. Wes Streeting, the then health secretary, issued a 22% pay rise in July 2024 in an effort to end the dispute.
However, the RDC sought a further rise, spread over several years, to make up for the erosion in the real-terms value of their salaries since 2008-09.
Thousands of resident doctors in England were set to stage a four-day walkout this month, which would have been the 16th round of strike action since 2023. However, it was called off after the offer was made.
In the last 12 months alone, resident medics have walked out for a total of 21 days, at a cost to the NHS of £50m a day. Thousands of patients, already facing long waiting times, have had appointments and operations cancelled as a result.
The BMA had previously said that if resident doctors chose to reject the deal, strikes would “have to escalate in intensity”.
But on Monday evening, the RDC said it had accepted the government’s latest pay offer, after 53% of eligible BMA members voted in favour in a referendum. Turnout was 57%, with 32,932 doctors voting.
Fletcher said this was “by no means the end of the road for pay restoration” and said he hoped the government would keep “this journey going”.
The health secretary, James Murray, said: “This is very good news for resident doctors, patients and the NHS as a whole, allowing us to draw a line under the disruption of previous months and focus on getting on with the job of rebuilding our health service.
“Because of this deal, resident doctors will benefit from a new pay structure, better career progression opportunities and a range of other improved conditions to support them as they rotate and train. Patients will be relieved that the NHS is entering a period of greater stability.
“But this is the beginning, not the end of the journey. I know there is much more to do, and I am determined to keep working constructively with resident doctors, all NHS staff, and the unions who represent them to improve their working lives and together build a health service that is fit for the future.”
Dean Royles, the interim chief executive of NHS Employers, said: “After such a long-running dispute that has caused so much upset and disruption to patient care, all parties will be pleased that a resolution now seems to have been found and there will be no further strike action.”
He said the “hard work of implementation will now begin” and called the timescales of the deal “ambitious”.
