Patients will be harmed when doctors go on strike this week, NHS leader warns

Some patients “will come to harm” when resident doctors go on strike later this week, a senior health leader has warned.

Daniel Elkeles, chief executive of NHS Providers, which represents NHS trusts, has already said industrial action could crush “fragile progress” and “wipe out a once-in-a-generation opportunity to fix the health service”.

Mr Elkeles told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Tuesday: “These are green shoots of recovery, and they’re not even and they’re not everywhere so they need nurturing.

“But I’m really optimistic from having gone around the country and I’ve visited 40 places in the last five months.

“There is amazing stuff happening in every part of the NHS, and we need it to come to the fore and to grow.

“The challenge with industrial action is that it distracts everybody from being able to do all the things they want to do to improve care, because all effort has to go into maintaining patient safety.

“And no matter how hard we try, some patients will come to harm in industrial action. So the NHS needs all of its workforce at work.”

Resident doctors across England are due to strike for five days from Friday in a dispute with the Government over pay and conditions.

British Medical Association (BMA) council chairman, Dr Tom Dolphin, said the Government “can put an end to these strikes by making doctors a decent offer.”

He said an NHS Providers survey of senior staff was “right about the rock bottom workforce morale in the NHS”.

He added that it “doesn’t make sense to leave some doctors scratching round for any shifts they can get, while the hospitals are crying out for more staff at the same time.

“Doctors need jobs, and patients need doctors; we should be able to solve this.

“Doctors are ready to work with the Government to end the dispute and avoid industrial action, but this needs them to value the workforce and sort out the pressure everyone is working under.

“They can’t keep asking people to do more and more with less and less.”

It comes as health leaders warned that St George’s flags are creating “no-go zones” for NHS staff, with some facing frequent abuse.

Workers feel intimidated by the presence of the flags across the country, including when they are visiting people in their own homes to give them treatment, according to several NHS trust chief executives and leaders.

The NHS Providers’ poll of senior managers found 45% were extremely concerned about discrimination towards NHS staff from patients and the public, while a further 33% were moderately concerned.

One trust leader, speaking to journalists anonymously, said there were issues around “how we work into the community” and that nurses often enter people’s homes alone.

“You are a nurse going in to a home,” he said. “You’re going in on your own, you’re locking the door behind you.

“I have been into homes with people who have been convicted of sex offences, and we go in and provide care to them.

“It can be a really precarious situation, and they (the nurses) handle that absolutely brilliantly.

“The autonomy and the clinical decisions that they make within that, I think, is fantastic.

“We saw during the time when the flags went up – our staff, who are a large minority of black and Asian staff, feeling deliberately intimidated.

“It felt like the flags were up creating no-go zones. That’s what it felt like to them.

“You add that on top of real autonomous working, that real bravery of working in people’s homes, with an environment… (where) it feels like it’s an area that’s designed to exclude them.

“Our staff continue to work in that environment, and I think they deserve our real praise and thanks as a nation, frankly, for doing that within those really difficult circumstances.”

He said staff can feel intimidated “and in, if I’m honest, in many cases, I think that’s what it was designed to feel like”.

He added that his trust had seen “individual instances of aggression towards staff”.

Another NHS trust leader said one member of their staff, who is white and has mixed race children, had asked some people putting up flags to move so she could park her car.

“The individuals filmed what was happening, and then followed her, and she continued to receive abuse over a series of several days, not because she objected to the flags, but because she disturbed them,” they said.

“There are lots of stories like that. There are lots of stories where people have tried to take flags down outside of their own homes and have been abused and threatened as a consequence of that.”

The leader said the “springing up of flags everywhere has created another form of intimidation and concern for many, many of our staff.”

Mr Elkeles said: “The NHS has relied on overseas recruitment for a long time to ensure we have the right workforce.

“We have a really diverse workforce and without that you can’t deliver the NHS.”

Royal College of Nursing general secretary Professor Nicola Ranger said: “Nursing staff dedicate their lives to caring for others, and too often they are faced with the most appalling hatred and intimidation.

A sustained campaign of anti-migrant rhetoric is fuelling a growing cesspool of racism, including against international and ethnic minority nursing staff, without whom our health and care system would simply cease to function.

“Those working in the community feel especially vulnerable and employers have a duty to ensure they are protected.

“Following a summer of further racist disorder, it is little wonder a growing number of nursing staff report feeling unsafe, particularly when having to work on their own and often at night.

“The Government and all politicians have to stop pandering to dangerous anti-migrant sentiments and employers must prioritise tackling racism and work with trade unions to develop stronger mechanisms to protect staff.”

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “There is no place for intimidation, racism or abuse in our country or our NHS. Instances of threats and aggression towards staff or their families should be reported to the police.

“We value the diversity of our NHS, which relies on the skill and dedication of hardworking staff from all backgrounds. They must be treated with dignity and respect.”