Junior doctors in Northern Ireland vote to take strike action over '16 years of pay erosion'

In a statement on Monday, the BMA’s NI junior doctors’ committee said 97.5% of those balloted supported a 24-hour walkout from 8am on March 6.

The industrial action will take place at hospitals across Northern Ireland.

Committee chair Dr Fiona Griffin described the outcome of the strike ballot as “a clear indication of the strength of feeling among junior doctors about years of pay erosion”.

She said: “It is clear from this result that junior doctors feel they have no other option but to strike. We owe it to ourselves, our patients and the future of the health service to act.

“We have had 16 years of pay erosion which now amounts to over 30% loss of pay, yet in this time our workload and burnout levels have risen.

"Coupled with rising inflation this is a huge financial loss for anyone in any profession, but it is causing an acute workforce crisis among junior doctors as many are thinking about leaving Northern Ireland to work elsewhere for better pay and working conditions, where the complex and skilled work we undertake is properly rewarded.

"These are the consultants, GPs and specialty doctors of the future, medics that we are relying on to drive down our waiting lists.”

Dr Griffin said that a recent pay meeting involving Department of Health officials left the various BMA chairs feeling “extremely disappointed and disheartened”.

Dr Griffin added: “We entered that meeting with the hope that good faith negotiations would commence on doctor’s pay asks. Instead we were presented with a fait accompli of a below inflation 6% uplift, that will be awarded in the next financial year.

"We were told any further discussions on pay had to be delayed until the ongoing Westminster pay negotiations with doctors in England had concluded, despite health and pay being devolved matters.

“All of this is simply unacceptable and is far from the spirit of meaningful engagement on pay. It further adds to the sense that the role doctors play in the health service is simply not valued.”