David Cameron Faces NHS Strikes And Calls To Resign

It's Only Monday And Already Cameron Is Having A Week To Forget
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Leader of the Conservative party David Cameron listens to constituents of Reading East talking about the cost of living, in Cafe Giardino, in the Oracle shopping centre, Reading.
Clara Molden/PA Archive

David Cameron has faced a difficult start to the political week as NHS workers stage a four-hour strike and a social media campaign calls for him to step down.

Hundreds of thousands of health workers, including midwives, nurses, radiographers, cleaners and psychiatric staff staged their second strike in a month.

Members of 11 unions walked out for four hours from 7am in England and 8am in Northern Ireland in protest at the Coalition's controversial decision not to accept a recommended 1% wage rise for all NHS employees.

Picket lines were mounted outside hospitals and ambulance centres, and the stoppage will be followed by a work to rule for the rest of the week.

A new row flared after the Government said it had put forward proposals to guarantee all staff would get at least 1% this year and next, but it had been rejected.

Unions said that "simply wasn't true", pointing out it was the Coalition's decision not to accept a recommendation from the Pay Review Body (PRB) which sparked the dispute earlier this year.

Meanwhile on Twitter the top trend on Monday morning - and much of the weekend - was #CameronMustGo.

The hashtag has been seized on as an opportunity to vent the public's anger at the government and list the apparent multitude of reasons why the Prime Minister should step down.

Unions across the country also got involved.

And - if true - this is just astounding.

Obviously some took the opportunity to make a joke.

But some tweets directed against Cameron were deemed too far. Guardian cookery writer Jack Monroe faced criticism for a tweet accusing the PM of using the memory of his dead son to further his agenda.

Ivan died aged six in 2009 after suffering from cerebral palsy and epilepsy. Cameron invoked his memory when defending his record on the NHS in a recent PMQs.

Monroe subsequently received a number of messages of abuse, some of which she retweeted.