No going back on December strike – UK nurses

Nurses across the UK are set go on strike after ministers rejected their pleas for formal talks over NHS pay.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) says there is no going back on the individual action, declaring that its members will  stage the national strike – the first in its 106-year history – on 15 and 20 December.

The industrial action is expected to last for 12 hours on both days – most likely between 8am and 8pm.

The unprecedented national industrial action will seriously disrupt care and is likely to be the first in a series of strikes over the winter and into the spring by other NHS staff, including junior doctors and ambulance workers.

The RCN said it had confirmed the dates after the UK government turned down its offer of formal, detailed negotiations as an alternative to industrial action.

“Ministers have had more than two weeks since we confirmed that our members felt such injustice that they would strike for the first time,” said the RCN general secretary, Pat Cullen. “My offer of formal negotiations was declined and, instead, ministers have chosen strike action.

“They have the power and the means to stop this by opening serious talks that address our dispute. Nursing staff have had enough of being taken for granted, enough of low pay and unsafe staffing levels, enough of not being able to give our patients the care they deserve.”

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The strikes will take place in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The RCN will announce which particular NHS employers will be affected next week, when formal notifications are submitted, it said.

In Scotland, the RCN has paused announcing strike action after the Scottish government reopened NHS pay negotiations.

The strikes are taking place after a series of individual ballots were held at NHS trusts and boards, rather than one national ballot.

At more than 40% of England’s hospitals, mental health and community services nurses will not be entitled to strike because the turnout was too low in those ballots. Action can happen, however, at all of Northern Ireland’s health boards and all but one in Wales.