More than half of the British public back the junior doctors' strikes, new polling suggests.
A poll conducted by the firm Ipsos has found that 54% of people back the industrial action set to take place this week. Junior doctors who are part of the British Medical Association (BMA) first walked out on strike for three days in March, and a second 96-hour-long strike is set to take place on Tuesday morning.
The junior doctors are demanding a pay deal which addresses a 26% fall in the real-terms value of their pay since 2008. The Government has expressed its dismay at the strikes, while senior figures including the NHS Confederation's chief executive Matthew Taylor have called on both sides to end their "battle of rhetoric” and call in independent arbitrators ACAS.
Read more: Newcastle care home in special measures after one resident managed to 'abscond' six times
In the North East, hospital bosses have warned that the coming strike action - running hot on the heels of the Bank Holiday weekend - is likely to cause extensive disruption and be a "different kettle of fish" to previous strikes. This is thought to be as less senior medics are available to cover for their colleagues due to the holiday period.
During the first wave of strikes, doctors on the picket lines told ChronicleLive: "There are more patients coming in, they have more conditions that need attending to and at the same time bed numbers in hospitals have decreased. All that together makes the work more difficult. And we are not worth 26% less than junior doctors in 2008."
The new polling show how junior doctors are the third most-likely group to get public support for their walkout - only trailing nurses (62%) and ambulance workers (58%). Ipsos's poll also found 49% of people felt junior doctors aren't paid enough. Less than 10% felt these groups were paid too much. The poll surveyed 1,092 adults over March 31 and April 1.
Keiran Pedley, research director at Ipsos, said: "These findings reflect a consistent pattern over time whereby the public tend to be most likely to support strike action for professions that they hold a more positive view of.”
Ahead of the second wave of strike action, the BMA has highlighted how it estimates three junior doctors might be paid less than £70 between them for carrying out a potentially life-saving appendix removal operation. The union said in a new ad campaign that three doctors with 10, seven and one year of experience would make just £28, £24.46, and £14.09.
The BMA has asked for a 35% pay rise to bring junior doctor pay back to 2008 levels, and help resolve the recruitment and retention crisis. Health Secretary Steve Barclay has blasted this demand as “unrealistic” and said their strikes had been planned to "cause maximum disruption".
READ NEXT:
- Join ChronicleLive's WhatsApp community for breaking news and top stories
- The 'deliberately inclusive' Northumberland primary school where 1 in 3 pupils has autism or ADHD
- Mental health nurse told patient 'to use sex toy to help get to sleep at night'
- 'Pillar of the West End community' inspires son's fundraising challenge during Ramadan
- Technology 'takes away all the worries' of getting repeat prescriptions over the holidays for Northumberland families
