On 9 March the junior doctors will go back on strike for another 48 hours of "emergency care only" provision. This comes as the response to Jeremy Hunt "going nuclear" and imposing a contract that would be devastating to the NHS, is a thinly veiled nod to privatisation, and has been widely discredited as being utter fucking nonsense.
My concern is this - Jeremy Hunt has already uttered those terrifying words that "history will judge" his actions. Whether his intentions for the NHS are actually honourable or steeped in greed, self-interest and idiocy is actually irrelevant at this stage. He has played his hand and the battle lines are drawn; he has dug his fox hole and is well supplied for a war of attrition. So what do we do? Work to rule? Prolonged emergency care strikes? Full walk out? Lobby for "back to the negotiating table"? I'm not sure we can win a war of attrition....
So what if we were to roll the dice?
What if we embrace the whispers of revolution that are riding the winds of disillusionment in the corridors of our once great NHS? What if we realise just how powerful we are? What if we decide we want real change? What if we man the fuck up and deliver that change?
Junior Doctor contract imposition would hit the NHS on Wednesday 3rd August 2016 - our time is running out and our lovely, caring, people centred government knows this. Saying we want real change, and in a matter of months, are big words behind a keyboard, I am the first to admit this, so how do we deliver these big words?
Humour me and tell me it didn't make you wonder....
Remember this - everything around you was created by man. The laws of the land, the infrastructure, the hospitals and schools, the learned helplessness of NHS workers and the British public, the mindset that we can't influence real change - all of it man made and wonderfully malleable once people realise it. And believe me the Tories realise that - they are real dicks but all of them rest atop a significant set of balls! They trade on the fact we don't share their self-assured view that the world is ours for the shaping.
So what if junior doctors were to shake off the shackles of this crippling learned helplessness? What if Junior Doctors were simply to say no to imposition and table a mass resignation?
No more strikes, no more arguments over mis-used data and government lies - we simply say no, enough, and table our notice en masse. We let the wonderful British Public decide whether they want an NHS or not. As midnight strikes on the 2nd August 2016 you will cease to have a health service unless there is real change - we will give you open and honest insight into the change we want to see and we will do it based on the notion of free world-class healthcare for ALL from cradle to grave.
Frustrated that the 11th March National Health Service Bill is struggling to gain the traction needed to safeguard and guarantee a free and nationalised health service for the generations to come? I will happily refuse to work until this is written into law......if 50,000 of my colleagues join in then there is simply no healthcare in this country without that bill.....are you really telling me that law couldn't be passed overnight if the public rose up behind us and demanded it?
We need to get back to WHY the NHS exists - we need significant reform that bolsters the foundations of an incredibly beautiful ideal. Our message to the public is simple: support us in that change or decide that you would rather take your chances with a private healthcare service.
We are not on strike for better pay - it makes no sense to claim otherwise as private healthcare makes doctors and their employers filthy rich. If the NHS is privatised my hours, my pay and my lifestyle will become mine to negotiate.......it will be a life of luxury for me and my family but the majority of this country will be...well.....you'll be fucked.
I am an NHS doctor because I am idealistic to a fault for the values it encompasses - if I was driven by money I simply wouldn't be an NHS doctor - it's not worth the headache!
We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to revolutionise how we value people in this country. NOW is the time to take it - if you don't then don't moan to me later - I won't be able to hear your pleas over the roar of my Bentley.
This contract is not an isolated issue. This is the frontline of the war for privatisation of the NHS. A war of attrition we will lose so NOW is the time to think big - anything other than big and bold and we lose.....it's a hail mary pass, a "shot to nothing".....the ones that always end up on the highlight reels and the "top 10" lists - damn they must feel good when they come off!
Let us table a mass resignation and demand massive change. Let this be the powder keg for much needed, dare I say it, "revolution" in this once astoundingly beautiful nation of ours. Let us do justice to the WWII generation who faught so hard for this NHS.
You have 6 months to make your decision........
In the meantime is there anyone else out there disillusioned who wants change? I sense there may be a few. Nurses? Porters? Radiographers? Pharmacists? Paramedics? How about an NHS wide mass-resignation tabled for 3rd August.....
Whilst we have thrown off the shackles of "what's possible" who else fancies making a stand? Tired of being forever beaten down and mocked by government corruption and lies? How about we up the ante and make the 3rd August the day Great Britain decided we would get back to basics and make it about the many not just the few? Can you feel it? It's just a whisper but just imagine what could be.....
Re-negotiation of PFI deals? MPs salaries and working days inextricably linked to all public sector workers? We are "in it together" remember. A GMC number given to the secretary for health so he works under the same code of conduct as doctors? No more secret deals or conflicts of interest in the dark corners of Westminster? No more LIES tolerated? Election manifestos and promises that cannot be broken without rigorous debate? What do YOU want? Have a think.....that's a democracy.......and remember ANYTHING is up for grabs!
The 3rd August - a national holiday for generations to come? Let your mind wander and tell me you didn't smile....