Majority of junior doctors plan to quit the NHS – with a third planning to jet off abroad
FOUR in ten new doctors will quit the NHS as soon as they can, a survey found.
The British Medical Association (BMA) said nearly half of junior medics want out of the health service before they even qualify.
A third of them plan to work as docs in other countries, with Australia the top destination.
The BMA said “poor pay and working conditions” were the main reasons young staff don’t want to stick around.
Junior doctors will vote on holding strike action over pay in January.
Professor Philip Banfield, council chair at the BMA, said: “For decades the NHS was the envy of the world, but without our doctors’ expertise the country will get sicker.”
The BMA held a poll of 4,553 junior doctors in November and December.
Forty per cent – 1,509 – said they would leave the NHS “as soon as I can find another job”.
Eight out of 10 said they wanted to leave because the pay is not rising fast enough.
Newly qualified doctors can receive a base rate of little more than £14 an hour, according to the trade union.
This is roughly level with the average hourly pay for all workers in the UK – which was £13.57 in 2021.
But the BMA claims that doctors enter their profession laden with debt from their medical education and that people’s lives rely on their work.
It comes as ten thousand ambulance staff at nine NHS trusts have walked out in the biggest 999 strike for 30 years, in a row over pay and conditions.
Health secretary Steve Barclay said unions have made a ‘conscious choice’ to inflict harm on patients.
Angry union bosses hit back, laying the blame for any patient deaths as a result of the strike action, firmly at the door of the Government.
Unison general secretary Christina McAnea said it was “irresponsible” of the government to refuse to open any kind of discussion or negotiations.
Meanwhile Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said blame for the strike “lies squarely at the floor of the Government”.
“I’ve never seen such an abdication of leadership like it in 25 years of negotiating,” she added.
Rishi Sunak insisted that refusing to negotiate on public sector pay is the “right thing” in the long term.