By Eniola Amadu
Resident doctors in Scotland are voting on whether to strike, saying the government has broken its pay agreement.
BMA Scotland stated that the planned uplift of 4.25% for 2025/26 would have ranked as the lowest in the UK and came in below what the independent pay review body advised.
However, Health Secretary, Neil Gray mentioned that it was a “fair, affordable, equitable pay offer” urging members not to strike.
The Scottish government had increased resident doctors’ pay over the past two years, warning that any strike action could delay efforts to cut waiting times.
Scotland’s resident doctors, formerly known as junior doctors, were set to commence a strike action in the summer of 2023 but the action was cancelled following a new pay offer.
Under the last agreement, BMA Scotland stated the government committed to making “credible progress” toward restoring pay to 2008 levels over the next three financial years.
Pay for a newly qualified foundation year doctor starts at £34,500, rising to £42,792 in the second year, while the resident doctor pay scale begins at £45,503.
The strike ballot will commence from Friday till December 19. The result will determine their next move. If it is a yes vote, industrial action is expected to begin in the first few weeks of the new year.
A member of the BMA’s Scottish resident doctor committee, Dr Chris Smith said: “Doctors have been shocked that the Scottish government seem to be intent on throwing away the progress made in restoring our pay over the last two years and are clear they will stand up to protect the deal which was agreed in good faith by both sides.”
Expressing their will to avert the impending strike action, he added: “As always, we are ready to negotiate at any time and any place. But we will not sit idle while the Scottish government attempts to break the deal that they struck with Scottish resident doctors in 2023.”
