Doctors’ leaders have agreed a new deal with the government that has raised hopes that strikes by consultants over their pay will soon come to an end.
The British Medical Association and Hospital Consultants and Specialists Association have secured a better package from ministers than the one consultants rejected by 51-49 in January.
Both the unions representing doctors are recommending their consultant members in England accept the revised offer. Consultants will stage separate votes on it between 14 March and 3 April.
If they accept the deal it will mean consultants take no further industrial action, after the nine days of strikes they took part in last July, August, September and October.
Saffron Cordery, the deputy chief executive of hospital body NHS Providers, said: “Trust leaders will be optimistic about this light at the end of the tunnel. It’s good to see that politicians and the union have reached a new offer.
“But after a five-day walkout by junior doctors last week, when the total number of routine patient appointments and procedures delayed by strikes since December 2022 topped 1.5m, there is still the worrying prospect of more disruptive industrial action in the NHS.”
The BMA said fresh negotiations in recent weeks with ministers after consultants rejected the first deal had yielded improvements, including more detail on changes to the operation of the review body on doctors’ and dentists’ remuneration (DDRB), which helps set the pay for both professions. The changes will help the DDRB regain the independence from ministers it has lost, it added.
In what may prove a crucial amendment to the original offer, consultants who have been at that level for between four and seven years will now receive a consolidated pay increase of £3,000, on top of the 6% rise for 2023-24 that ministers awarded all senior doctors last summer.
Dr Vishal Sharma, the chair of the BMA’s consultants committee, said the talks had produced enough progress on issues not resolved in the first deal for the union to put this new package to consultants, this time with a recommendation that they accept it “and in doing so end the current pay dispute and prevent further industrial action”.
The Department of Health and Social Care described the revised offer as “a good deal for doctors, a good deal for patients and a good deal for taxpayers”.
Victoria Atkins, the health and social care secretary, said: “It paves the way to ending industrial action by consultants following many weeks of constructive dialogue and represents a good offer for consultants, patients and the taxpayer.”
