Well being Secretary Steve Barclay mentioned NHS strikes this winter are in “no person’s finest pursuits” and union pay calls for are “not reasonably priced” after it was introduced paramedics and different ambulance staff are set to walkout.
Unison, which represents lots of of 1000’s of well being staff, together with ambulance workers in addition to porters and cleaners, mentioned final evening that 80,000 of its members had backed taking industrial motion.
In the meantime, GMB – the most important union for ambulance workers – is predicted right this moment to declare its members have voted overwhelmingly in favour of walkouts. It could be the primary nationwide ambulance strike for greater than 30 years.
The announcement by Unison comes after the Royal Faculty of Nursing scheduled its personal strike motion on December 15 and 20.
Mr Barclay mentioned in an announcement issued this morning: “I’m massively grateful for the exhausting work and dedication of NHS workers and deeply remorse some will likely be taking industrial motion – which is in no person’s finest pursuits as we method a difficult winter.
“Our financial circumstances imply unions’ calls for usually are not reasonably priced – every further one per cent pay rise for all workers on the Agenda for Change contract would value round £700 million a yr.”
Mr Barclay mentioned the Authorities’s “precedence is protecting sufferers protected throughout any strikes” as he insisted “my door stays open to debate with the unions methods we are able to make the NHS a greater place to work”.
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