100 signatures reached
To: Jeremy Hunt
Opposing Junior Doctor Contract changes
Stop the ideological imposition of unfair and unsafe working hours and pay conditions on Junior Doctors. This is an ideological roadmap to devalue the medical profession and reduce public belief in the credibility of an affordable and safe National Health Service, so that ultimately further privatisation can occur unopposed by the public.
Why is this important?
The NHS is internationally envied for its clinical excellency, efficiency and moral courage. Following the purchaser provider split and changes under New Labour in the late 1990's, the introduction of private contracting has diverted profits from services out of the NHS into wealth creating companies. Subsequently healthcare professionals and patients have seen and felt the NHS change for the worse.
Since this Conservative party came into government they have undertaken steps to undermine the financial viability and safety of care provided by the NHS through an ideological choice of chronic underfunding. To quote Noam Chomsky, "that's the standard technique of privatisation: defund, make sure things don't work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital".
They are now targeting staff and junior doctors. Following negotiations with the BMA doctors union, the department of health offered an unacceptable contract which would reduce patient safety, increase junior doctor fatigue, reduce recognized out-of-hours commitment, and significantly reduce take-home pay. When junior doctors refused the governments precondition to accept ALL of these proposals as a basis to a final contract as a condition of restarting negotiations, the BMA found themselves accused of ‘walking away’ from the table and informed that the contract would simply be imposed upon them in August 2016.
Junior doctors, side by side with other healthcare professionals, work in an increasingly pressurised and under-resourced setting, and are known as the medical workhorse of the NHS. Their current working pattern is antisocial and labour intensive, as anybody who lives with or is friends with a junior doctor will know. Tiredness is compounded by a sense of disenchantment, which may explain why these professional healthcare groups did not feel energised enough to understand or stand up to the government on their introduction of the Health and Social Care Act in 2012. Legislation which is leading to the erosion of the NHS in the hands of a Jeremy Hunt, who prior to his appointment as health minister wrote of this ideological support for privatisation of the NHS.
Junior doctors now face a situation where their self-perceived head to the ground and carry-on grafting attitude is being rewarded by a contract which is estimated to lead to a startling 20-40% reduction in take home wages depending on speciality, and longer and less protected shifts. The new system would provide us with the assurance of a 20 minute break per 11 hour shift worked. Fatigue from grueling shifts are acknowledged to cause impaired performance, a sobering and concerning fact for patients.
We as junior doctors accept that our pay has declined against inflation for years. However, we are asking that this government's ideological CHOICE to devalue our profession, and take money and morale from junior doctors, when the financial privileges freedoms of the very rich and financial sector are protected, be acknowledged and challenged. We oppose government ministers with personal wealth of millions using our wages, which when compared to other peers with similar backgrounds in university and post-graduate years in training are modest, as another excuse to paint the NHS as 'unaffordable'. An NHS which is acknowledged as excellent in the care it delivers, and one of the most efficient services on the planet.
This Junior Doctor contract campaign must form part of a wider effort to oppose the overarching plan to ultimately do away with the NHS. As things stand, in 20 years, I as a junior doctor will be working as a private consultant for a private health provider, possibly earning more than an NHS consultant, but paying for my own and my families healthcare in times of greatest vulnerability. I would not chose to be treated by, or treat on behalf of, private companies and insurance merchants for whom profit is the primary concern. A great many who earn less than me may go without the best chances of surviving illness due to their bank balance. I reject that future. I wish to work proudly as an NHS doctor, in the United Kingdom. I believe that patients also wish to be treated by a trustworthy NHS rather than a private company. An NHS staffed by motivated, valued and supported professionals and not by profit.
Please sign this petition to support junior doctors, the NHS, and the public.
Since this Conservative party came into government they have undertaken steps to undermine the financial viability and safety of care provided by the NHS through an ideological choice of chronic underfunding. To quote Noam Chomsky, "that's the standard technique of privatisation: defund, make sure things don't work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital".
They are now targeting staff and junior doctors. Following negotiations with the BMA doctors union, the department of health offered an unacceptable contract which would reduce patient safety, increase junior doctor fatigue, reduce recognized out-of-hours commitment, and significantly reduce take-home pay. When junior doctors refused the governments precondition to accept ALL of these proposals as a basis to a final contract as a condition of restarting negotiations, the BMA found themselves accused of ‘walking away’ from the table and informed that the contract would simply be imposed upon them in August 2016.
Junior doctors, side by side with other healthcare professionals, work in an increasingly pressurised and under-resourced setting, and are known as the medical workhorse of the NHS. Their current working pattern is antisocial and labour intensive, as anybody who lives with or is friends with a junior doctor will know. Tiredness is compounded by a sense of disenchantment, which may explain why these professional healthcare groups did not feel energised enough to understand or stand up to the government on their introduction of the Health and Social Care Act in 2012. Legislation which is leading to the erosion of the NHS in the hands of a Jeremy Hunt, who prior to his appointment as health minister wrote of this ideological support for privatisation of the NHS.
Junior doctors now face a situation where their self-perceived head to the ground and carry-on grafting attitude is being rewarded by a contract which is estimated to lead to a startling 20-40% reduction in take home wages depending on speciality, and longer and less protected shifts. The new system would provide us with the assurance of a 20 minute break per 11 hour shift worked. Fatigue from grueling shifts are acknowledged to cause impaired performance, a sobering and concerning fact for patients.
We as junior doctors accept that our pay has declined against inflation for years. However, we are asking that this government's ideological CHOICE to devalue our profession, and take money and morale from junior doctors, when the financial privileges freedoms of the very rich and financial sector are protected, be acknowledged and challenged. We oppose government ministers with personal wealth of millions using our wages, which when compared to other peers with similar backgrounds in university and post-graduate years in training are modest, as another excuse to paint the NHS as 'unaffordable'. An NHS which is acknowledged as excellent in the care it delivers, and one of the most efficient services on the planet.
This Junior Doctor contract campaign must form part of a wider effort to oppose the overarching plan to ultimately do away with the NHS. As things stand, in 20 years, I as a junior doctor will be working as a private consultant for a private health provider, possibly earning more than an NHS consultant, but paying for my own and my families healthcare in times of greatest vulnerability. I would not chose to be treated by, or treat on behalf of, private companies and insurance merchants for whom profit is the primary concern. A great many who earn less than me may go without the best chances of surviving illness due to their bank balance. I reject that future. I wish to work proudly as an NHS doctor, in the United Kingdom. I believe that patients also wish to be treated by a trustworthy NHS rather than a private company. An NHS staffed by motivated, valued and supported professionals and not by profit.
Please sign this petition to support junior doctors, the NHS, and the public.
