Streeting: I’ve had it with striking doctors

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Friday, 25 July 2025 Good morning and welcome to From the Editor. Wes Streeting’s patience with striking doctors is clearly running out. In a call with NHS leaders he told them medics must feel the “pain” of their industrial action that begins today. Streeting’s frustration continues in a piece for us below in which he says the walkout is “completely unnecessary”. Meanwhile, speaking to the Daily T, Robert Winston warns that patient safety is at risk and the industrial action undermines confidence in healthcare services. I’d love to hear what you think of this newsletter. You can email me your feedback here. Chris Evans, Editor P.S. You can now enjoy everything The Telegraph has to offer in our summer sale. Claim 1 year of full access for just £25.   Today’s headlines Move migrants from Epping, demands Essex police chief Corbyn launches hard-Left ‘Your Party’ to challenge Starmer Jewish schoolchildren kicked off plane after ‘singing Hebrew songs’ Holiday villas reduced to ashes in Cyprus wildfires Record number of farms shut in wake of inheritance tax raid Tortoise found 2.8 miles from home after 16 days on the run Hulk Hogan dies aged 71 Shoplifting epidemic sees three thefts every minute Israel-Hamas negotiations collapse Free speech lives here Enjoy journalism that’s proud to share your values Enjoy 1 year for £25 in our Summer Sale Subscribe now   One way or another, doctors will be punished for this Thousands of resident doctors will go on strike today Wes Streeting is furious, reports Laura Donnelly, our Health Editor. Today, up to 50,000 junior doctors – rebranded as resident doctors, in one of his early attempts at a charm offensive – will go on strike. The five-day walkout is the first national strike by a healthcare union under a Labour government since the winter of discontent in 1979. And it comes after the party boosted pay for such medics by a whopping 29 per cent, and after the collapse of talks with British Medical Association (BMA) leaders on Tuesday. Mr Streeting is determined to make striking doctors and the BMA suffer the consequences of their actions, instead of the public. As The Telegraph reveals today, he is fearful that if the strikes are “pain-free” for resident doctors, there could be a spread of walkouts across the public sector. And so, doctors who take part in the strikes can expect to feel the repercussions. Some are financial. The NHS will attempt to cancel as few appointments and operations as possible in an effort to maintain patient safety and avoid backlogs. This has a crucial knock-on effect, limiting the possibility for doctors to enjoy generous overtime rates while clearing up the mess afterwards. Medics are also being warned that repeated absences from the front line in walkouts could slow down their career progression. But actually, the biggest “pain” facing striking doctors may come from the court of public opinion. Patience has worn extremely thin – and both the public and less well-paid NHS workers carrying an extra load in the coming days may not forgive the doctors who down tools. Wes Streeting Health Secretary   I am sure Telegraph readers will be frustrated and angry this morning at the decision of the BMA resident doctors committee to call completely unnecessary strikes. Believe me when I say I feel exactly the same. The BMA’s leadership, who I believe are badly letting down both their members and the health service, will find that the costs of the strikes are that they now have a secretary of state who has both less appetite and less ability to work with them on the kind of measures we were having constructive discussions about last week that would materially improve the working lives of resident doctors and leave them with more money in their pockets. I have been upfront with the BMA from the start that I could not go further on pay than we already have this year. Resident doctors have had a 28.9 per cent pay hike over the last three years and the highest pay rise across the whole public sector for the last two. It is completely unreasonable for the BMA’s leadership to demand another 28 per cent on top. The country cannot afford it. It’s also not fair to patients, nor to other NHS staff, many of whom earn a lot less than doctors. The BMA has misjudged me and this Government and they have squandered a great deal of goodwill in the process. It cannot be patients and taxpayers who continue to pay the price for the damage the BMA leadership’s actions will cause. By walking away from the table, they have cut off their nose to spite their face. 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