Junior doctors at Salford Royal praise public support for strikes

JUNIOR doctors at Salford Royal praised the support they received from the public during the strike action on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The hospital medics said the strike had been warranted due to the government’s failure to listen to public opinion and compromise over the new contract that is being imposed.

Mark McInerney, a junior doctor at Salford Royal, said: “The government, on many issues, will just ignore the public. They’re not a big priority in their eyes, they have an agenda which they will push through.

“I’m fed up with hearing the manifesto spin headlines, I just want to have an honest conversation about the concerns we’ve all got, the government aren’t taking it seriously.”

Untitled-2 — Mark McInerney says he is unhappy with the Government’s handling of the new contracts.

Members of the British Medical Association (BMA) are striking over the implementation of a new contract for all junior doctors in the NHS.

The contract has changes to pay and, most importantly, changes to what constitutes unsociable hours. Junior doctors say this is unsafe in terms of patient care and has led to 78 per cent of junior doctors taking part in two days of strike action.

The public showed their support for the striking doctors, with many cars passing the hospital sounding their horns to show solidarity.

Barry Walker, 68, of Gorton, who was at the hospital with his wife said he supported junior doctors in the action they were taking: “I should imagine they’ve gone down many routes before they’ve got to this stage and if this is what it takes, so be it.”

Marie Smith, a multi-disciplinary co-ordinator at the hospital, who was working on Wednesday, said the government had not had enough dialogue with doctors and they had been forced into the action.

“It’s about patient care and their rights, they’ve not worked really hard to be doctors to be shoehorned by the government in a really unfair way, it’s bullying.”

Her co-worker, Dianne Jones, believed the government had underestimated junior doctors: “They know what they’re talking about and that’s what the government don’t like, they’ve met them head to head.”

The target for much of the anger over the dispute has been health secretary Jeremy Hunt, who this week said in parliament: “We should not lose sight of the underlying reason for this dispute, namely this government’s determination to be the first country in the world to offer a proper patient-focused seven day health service. To help deliver this, the NHS will this year receive the sixth biggest funding increase in its history.”