Truth behind the doctors’ walkouts

Damning texts reveal union chiefs only cared about pay ... and plotted to drag out dispute for 18 months

JUNIOR doctors plotted to strike for 18 months and their main motivation was pay, extraordinary leaked messages have revealed.

Senior figures at their union planned to ‘tie the Government in knots’ and admitted they didn’t care about anything other than ‘extracting the best con- tract’. In one exchange, their leader Dr Johann Malawana said he ‘loved the idea’ of a wave of highly disruptive strikes.

The messages also reveal the senior members of the British Medical Association were princi- pally concerned about their earnings – not patient safety, as they had publicly claimed.

When the members of the BMA’s Junior Doctors Committee were debating whether to consider dropping their demands for premium hourly pay on Saturdays, Dr Arrash Arya Yassaee replied: ‘Bluntly, no.’

Dr Kitty Mohan, another senior BMA executive, said Saturday pay was the ‘only real red line’ and the ‘thing 99 per cent of juniors told us they were upset about’.

The union has now agreed to postpone further strikes, which have so far seen thousands of operations cancelled, as it considers whether or not to accept a reformed contract from the Government. Up to 55,000 junior doctors will take part in a mass vote next month and if they say no, further negotiations or industrial action may follow.

The dispute centres on a proposed contract that will see them paid normally on Saturdays, rather than receiving premium rates. The BMA insisted they were rejecting

‘Patients will be appalled’

the contract because it was ‘unsafe’ and would lead to exhausted doctors making mistakes.

But these messages – leaked to the Health Service Journal – reveal union executives were actually far more obsessed with their pay.

They were sent between members of the committee, who coordinated the strikes, via WhatsApp, an instant messaging service.

In December – just as talks with the Government were breaking down – Dr Malawana proposed a ‘strategy that tied the DH [Department of Health] up in knots for the next 16-18 months’. He added: ‘The best solution may actually [be] to draw this right out.

‘Into the Europe debate and leadership debate. Punctuated [industrial action] for a prolonged period and force them to impose against our support.’ Later that month he wrote: ‘The more I think about it the more I love our plan. Basically five weeks of headlines about juniors strikes through Jan- uary and February.’ And on January 15 – just after the first strike – Dr Malawana wrote: ‘I don’t care about anything apart from extracting the best contract. Don’t give a s*** about anything else.’

The messages also reveal a split between the BMA’s hardline Junior Doctors Committee and the union’s chief executive, Dr Mark Porter, who was keen to negotiate a deal with the Government.

Yesterday Jonathan Isaby, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: ‘Patients will be appalled to discover that far from being concerned for their safety, the BMA has been playing a “political game” to maximise disruption in the NHS.

‘It’s now clear as day that they had no intention of entering serious negotiations and it was all about getting as much money as they possibly could.’

A BMA spokesman said: ‘Private discussions should not be mistaken for the agreed strategy of the BMA Junior Doctors Committee.’

A Department of Health spokesman declined to comment, saying the messages were a matter for the BMA.