GMB calls four more national ambulance strikes, saying ‘demonisaton’ of staff by ministers has ‘made things worse’
The GMB union has announced four more days of ambulance strikes in February and March. The union says more than 10,000 of its ambulance staff members will strike on 6 and 20 February, and 6 and 20 March.
The strikes will affect the following regions in England: south-west; south-east; north-west; south-central; north-east; east Midlands; and Yorkshire. Wales will be affected too.
In addition, GMB ambulance staff in the West Midlands will strike on 23 January, and in the north-west on 24 January.
Rachel Harrison, the GMB’s national secretary, said:
GMB’s ambulance workers are angry. In their own words ‘they are done’.
Our message to the government is clear – talk pay now.
Ministers have made things worse by demonising the ambulance workers who provided life and limb cover on strike days – playing political games with their scaremongering.
The only way to solve this dispute is a proper pay offer.
But it seems the cold, dead hands of the Number 10 and 11 Downing Street are stopping this from happening.
In the face of government inaction, we are left with no choice but industrial action.
By “demonising ambulance workers”, Harrison is referring to ministers criticising health unions for not negotiating emergency cover arrangements for strike days at a national level. The unions say they negotiated those deals locally, trust by trust, because that is how staff are employed.
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Teaching unions report ‘no progress’ after further talks with education secretary
Sally Weale
Talks between the teaching unions and education secretary Gillian Keegan broke up after just over an hour this morning, with unions reporting zero progress.
Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the National Education Union (NEU) whose members have voted for strike action, said the meeting was “constructive” and the secretary of state had been keen to talk about issues affecting teachers like workload and recruitment and retention.
There was however no discussion about an improved pay deal, either this year or next. “I’m happy to talk about all these other issues,” said Bousted, “but we’re not talking about things that will resolve the pay dispute.” The NEU is due to begin seven days of strike action on 1 February.
Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said:
While it is good that these talks are continuing, and we are fully supportive of an ongoing dialogue, we have to report that no progress was made at this meeting and we are no nearer a solution.
There remain three unresolved issues, Barton said. He explained:
The first is the inadequacy of the pay award in this academic year, which at 5% for most teachers and leaders is well below inflation, currently running at 13.4% on the retail prices index measure and 10.5% on the consumer prices index measure. The fact that the pay award was not fully funded by the government has piled more financial pressure on to school leaders and governors.
The second is next year’s pay award which the education secretary has already sought to constrain in her remit letter to the pay review body, where she says it is particularly important to have regard to the government’s inflation target – which at 2% would represent yet another substantial below-inflation pay award.
The third is the unsustainable workload of leaders and teachers. This is a direct consequence of the insufficiency of government funding to education over the past 12 years which has left staff having to do more work with fewer resources.
Nobody wants to see industrial action, but it is not surprising that members of the NEU have voted in favour of strike action in these circumstances. Teacher shortages are a critical issue for virtually every school and college in the country and are causing educational damage on a daily basis. The government must do better for teachers, leaders and pupils.
George Eustice says he’s standing down at next election
Aletha Adu
George Eustice has become the latest Conservative MP to announce their plans to step down from politics. The former environment minister has represented the Camborne & Redruth constituency in Cornwall since 2010.
In a statement Eustice said:
By the time of the next election, I will have been in politics for 25 years, including almost 15 years as a member of parliament.
I will also be 53 and I want the opportunity to do a final career outside politics, so have decided not to seek re-election. This has been a difficult decision for me.
I feel a deep bond to the area where my family have lived for over 400 years and it has been an honour to represent my home towns, but it is important that the Conservatives are able to select a new candidate in good time.
Eustice had been predicted to lose his seat to Labour, according to a number of pollsters. In 2019 he had a majority of 8,700.
More than a dozen Tory MPs have now announced they will be stepping down, from Sajid Javid to the 29-year-old Dehenna Davison, once dubbed a rising star.
GMB calls four more national ambulance strikes, saying ‘demonisaton’ of staff by ministers has ‘made things worse’
The GMB union has announced four more days of ambulance strikes in February and March. The union says more than 10,000 of its ambulance staff members will strike on 6 and 20 February, and 6 and 20 March.
The strikes will affect the following regions in England: south-west; south-east; north-west; south-central; north-east; east Midlands; and Yorkshire. Wales will be affected too.
In addition, GMB ambulance staff in the West Midlands will strike on 23 January, and in the north-west on 24 January.
Rachel Harrison, the GMB’s national secretary, said:
GMB’s ambulance workers are angry. In their own words ‘they are done’.
Our message to the government is clear – talk pay now.
Ministers have made things worse by demonising the ambulance workers who provided life and limb cover on strike days – playing political games with their scaremongering.
The only way to solve this dispute is a proper pay offer.
But it seems the cold, dead hands of the Number 10 and 11 Downing Street are stopping this from happening.
In the face of government inaction, we are left with no choice but industrial action.
By “demonising ambulance workers”, Harrison is referring to ministers criticising health unions for not negotiating emergency cover arrangements for strike days at a national level. The unions say they negotiated those deals locally, trust by trust, because that is how staff are employed.
Following PMQs, the Labour party put out a news release saying in England “37,000 people with ‘emergency’ conditions, such as suspected strokes or heart attacks, had to wait more than 3 hours and 40 minutes for an ambulance in December”. It said:
The average response time for so-called ‘category 2 ambulance calls’ was a staggering hour and 32 minutes, while one in 10 patients in this category waited three hours and 41 minutes or longer. Category 2 is for “emergency calls” – for conditions such as heart attacks and strokes. The response time is more than 12 times the NHS target of 18 minutes.
Waiting times for “urgent” cases – for conditions such as late stages of labour, non-severe burns, and diabetic attacks – also reached record highs in December. The average response time for category 3 ambulance calls was 4 hours and 18 minutes, while 8,700 patients with such conditions waited more than 11 hours.
PMQs – snap verdict
Among the many reasons to be outraged about the condition of public services in Britain at the moment (yesterday we learned Penny Mordaunt, the leader of the Commons, seems to have joined the 57% of people who think “nothing works any more”), none is more powerful than the fact that you can no longer rely on an ambulance to turn up on time in an emergency. Keir Starmer focused on that today and it enabled him to produce one of his most powerful PMQs demolition jobs yet.
The statistics did most of the work, but what made this particularly effective was the way Starmer set out his case. First, a pithy question (which Sunak refused to answer):
It’s three minutes past 12. If somebody phones 999 now because they have chest pains and fear it might be a heart attack, when would the prime minister expect an ambulance to arrive?
This question – by anchoring itself in the present, at PMQs in 12.03pm – gave the exchanges an immediacy they never normally have, and Starmer followed that up with more questions that almost dramatised his scenario.
If our heart attack victim had called for an ambulance in Peterborough at 12.03pm it wouldn’t arrive until 2:10pm. These are our constituents waiting for ambulances I’m talking about …
If they were in Northampton it wouldn’t arrive until 2.20pm, if they were in Plymouth it wouldn’t arrive until 2.40pm.
In his third question, Starmer was elaborating on his narrative.
By 1pm our heart attack victim is in a bad way, sweaty, dizzy, chest tightening … by that time they should be getting treatment, but an hour after they’ve called 999 they’re still lying there, waiting, listening to the clock tick.
And then came the reveal; Starmer said this wasn’t hypothetical, “this is real life”. He was talking about Stephanie, 26, a cancer patient from Plymouth, who died waiting for an ambulance, even thought she only lived two miles from the hospital.
For a prime minister on the receiving end of a barrage like this, there is no winning strategy. The best option is full-on empathy, laced with humility and sometimes apology. Tony Blair or David Cameron could pull this sort of thing off. But Sunak – who has yet to shake off the impression that he’s a geek management consultant hired to clear up the appalling mess left by the outgoing administration – cannot match them in emotional intelligence, and instead he resorted to going on the attack over Labour’s failure to back the anti-strikes bill.
It might not be an entirely hopeless strategy. According to the polls, public support for the legislation is quite strong. But the public don’t blame the unions for the crisis in the NHS, and minimum service levels on strike days won’t help anyone like Stephanie who needs minimum services on non-strike days too. The public seem to get this, and today it was Starmer who was speaking up for what they think.
This is from my colleague Pippa Crerar on Rishi Sunak’s false claim that Nadhim Zahawi has addressed the issues raised by the report that he paid millions to settle a tax issue. (See 12.36pm.)
Rishi Sunak, asked about Tory minister Nadhim Zahawi’s tax affairs, tells MPs: “My honourable friend has already addressed this matter in full.”
Except he hasn’t addressed matter AT ALL. Perhaps a good moment to remind that my contact details are above. https://t.co/904zxrOhgZ
— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) January 18, 2023
Imran Hussain (Lab) asks about a BBC report saying the Foreign Office was aware of Narendra Modi’s involvement in a “grave act of ethnic cleansing” before he became India’s prime minister.
Sunak says he does not agree “at all” with how Hussain described this.
Aaron Bell (Con) says he supports Sunak’s ambition to stop the boats. Will the PM ensure that people who make that journey are removed?
Sunak says the government “must go further” and introduce legislation saying if you enter the country illegally, you will be removed.
Alex Sobel (Lab) asks if Sunak was aware of the payments of millons to settle a tax bill by Nadhim Zahawi when he appointed him to cabinet as Tory chair.
Sunak says Zahawi has already addressed this in full, and he has nothing to add.
(That is untrue. Zahawi has put out a statement, but that statement does not address the matter in full.)
Laura Farris (Con) asks if the PM agrees that the public should be entitled to basic minimum services. And does the PM agree that Tony Blair was right to say the biggest defect with Labour when it was born was its link to organised labour?
Sunak says in other countries the emergency services are banned from going on strike.
Kenny MacAskill (Alba) says Sunak should ensure that there is an equalisation of tariffs for energy companies, so that the poor do not have to pay most.
Sunak says what MacAskill is proposing could increase bills for most people. The government is consulting on what to do going ahead, including the idea of a social tariff.
