Junior doctors march through Bristol to fight for 35% pay rise

Scores of junior doctors took to the streets of Bristol on Monday for the final day of an unprecedented walkout over pay.

Members of the British Medical Association (BMA) formed a picket line outside the Bristol Royal Infirmary (BRI) in the morning before marching down to College Green at 1pm.

Shouts of “What do we want? Fair pay”, “claps don’t pay the bills” and “overworked, underpaid” could be heard as the demonstration wound down Park Row and Park Street.

Junior doctors – any doctor below consultant level – are calling for a 35 per cent pay rise, or “restorative pay”, to make up for years of below-inflation increases.

The government has said the union’s pay demands are unreasonable and has offered a six per cent rise.

Striking junior doctors like Taylor-Smith want to achieve “full pay restoration to reverse the steep decline in pay faced by junior doctors since 2008”

Speaking to Bristol24/7 from the picket line, Sam Taylor-Smith, 28, said it was “incredibly demoralising” to work for the NHS in the current climate.

“It’s so frustrating seeing patients not get the care that they deserve,” the junior doctor based at Southmead Hospital said.

“Constantly having to apologise for delays to operations, clinics, procedures and not being able to get around to see people in good time on the weekends and overnight because we’re so understaffed.

Taylor-Smith added: “I’m here because we ultimately believe in a future where the NHS is fully funded and fully staffed.”

Junior doctors’ message for @SteveBarclay from the picket lines at the BRI @SouthWestBMA pic.twitter.com/rJUHL8skcv

— Betty Woolerton (@bettywoolerton) July 17, 2023

The five-day-long strike, one of the longest strikes in NHS history, began on the same day that prime minister Rishi Sunak announced a six per cent “final” pay offer for junior doctors as part of wide-ranging pay offers for the public sector.

But the BMA warned that “doctors are in this for the long run” as it refused to call off industrial action.

Health secretary Steve Barclay said that the walkout will put “patient safety and efforts to cut waiting lists at risk”.

The BMA said the pay award of six per cent amounted to “another real-terms pay cut”

Also protesting outside the BRI was Hamish Macdonald, 34, an orthopaedic registrar at Southmead Hospital.

“Working for the NHS is massively hard work,” Macdonald said. “Patients are sicker and there’s more of them, especially after COVID. We’re seeing people coming in later. We get worse pathology than they used to have.

“On top of this, it feels like there’s fewer and fewer doctors who are able to treat them.

He added: “I know how to treat people, but in today’s NHS it’s often impossible to do in a timely manner.”

The junior doctors’ strike will be closely followed by two days of industrial action by hospital consultants and hospital dentists, taking place from Thursday until Saturday.

All photos & video: Betty Woolerton

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