Thousands of doctors in England to strike again as health likely to become a key UK election issue

Thousands of doctors in the early years of their careers in England are to go on strike later this month for another five-day stretch as their long-standing pay dispute with the British government remains in stasis

LONDON -- Thousands of doctors in the early years of their careers in England are to go on strike later this month for another five-day stretch as their long-standing pay dispute with the British government remains in stasis.

The British Medical Association, the union that represents the so-called junior doctors, said on Friday that the government had “failed to meet the deadline to put an improved pay offer on the table” and that they would go on strike from Feb. 24 to Feb. 28.

The junior doctors, who form the backbone of hospital and clinical care as they train up to be specialists in a particular field, have walked off the job on nine occasions over the past year and last month they went on strike for six days, the longest in the history of the state-funded National Health Service.

“We remain willing to carry on talking and to cancel the forthcoming strikes if significant progress is made and a credible offer is put forward,” the BMA’s junior doctors committee co-chairs Dr. Robert Laurenson and Dr. Vivek Trivedi said.

The union says newly qualified doctors earn 15.53 pounds ($19.37) an hour — the U.K. minimum wage is just over 10 pounds an hour — though salaries rise rapidly after the first year. The BMA has been asking for 35% “pay restoration” as its starting position, but has said it is willing to negotiate.