Government agrees to reopen pay talks with BMA consultants committee

The Department of Health and Social Care has offered to reopen pay talks with the BMA consultants committee after refusing to meet with the committee for more than 200 days.

Earlier this month, the BMA wrote to the government inviting ministers to talks facilitated by the conciliation service ACAS.

In her letter, BMA consultants committee chair Dr Vishal Sharma said that further strike action could be avoided if the government puts forward a “credible offer”.

A “credible offer”, according to the committee, is an offer above the level of RPI inflation for the 12 months until April 2023 – the annual rate of inflation peaked at 11.4% in October 2022, reaching a 41-year high.

Previously, the BMA consultants committee has said they would call off strike action if they were offered 12.4% – the same deal junior doctors were offered in Scotland.

However, this is roughly double what the health secretary had initially offered at 6%, which he deemed to be a “fair and reasonable pay rise.”

Consultants want to see pay review body become ‘fully independent’

Dr Vishal Sharma says it is “good to see the government is willing to come to the table” and the Committee now hopes ministers will “commit to serious negotiations with a view to bringing this avoidable dispute to a conclusion.”

However, Dr Sharma also wants to see the government fix the “broken” pay review body by restoring its full independence.

“The BMA consultants committee has been clear that reform of the broken pay review process is essential to resolving this dispute and that the reformed pay review body is to make truly independent recommendations on pay in order to correct for the losses that consultants have experienced that have resulted in the current workforce crisis.

“We will be expecting to discuss and explore other solutions in the forthcoming talks,” Dr Sharma said.

Not yet cause for celebration

NHS leaders have said this development is a “positive step in the right direction”, but warn there is not yet “cause for celebration”.

Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation said: “Given the huge disruption that industrial action has caused to patient care over the last ten months, health leaders will be cautiously optimistic about the government’s invitation to the BMA’s consultants committee to begin negotiations.

“With the government and the junior doctors committee still at a standstill, and the results of the indicative ballot for SAS doctors imminent, the looming threat of further strikes facing the NHS remains.

“Health leaders will be hopeful that these talks with the consultants committee will resolve the concerns among senior doctors and then be used as a springboard for negotiations to begin with the junior doctors and other groups, so that we can find a way out of what has become a painful dispute, not least for patients.”