Should doctors take industrial action?

Up to a hundred surgeries across the UK may close today as part of an unofficial protest being staged by GPs.

The national doctors 'Day of Action' has been organised by Doctor Magazine, who say that 8 out of 10 doctors would quit the NHS if they could.

Doctors want to publicise their demands for thousands of new recruits, longer consultation time and shorter hours.

But the British Medical Association, which represents doctors, has dubbed the action inappropriate and it has been condemned by the head of the NHS Confederation.

Should doctors take industrial action? Are they justified in their actions? Have you been witness to an overworked doctor?

This debate is now closed. Read a selection of your comments below.

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Your reaction

In common with Education, the biggest problem of the NHS is not under-funding or whinging staff but the sorry fact of being a political football. Education, health and the police are far too important to be left in the hands of politicians who are more concerned with sound bites and the next election than with the real needs of the people of this country
Derek, UK

When we consider the sheer and utter decimation that was our NHS when this Labour government came to power, I think it is a miracle that we have been able to recruit 17,000 more nurses and over 5,000 more doctors, And no-one is saying that it is in an ideal situation but it is certainly better than it was four years ago. I do not hold with all this doom and gloom over our NHS, it IS improving and it will continue to improve if the current investment is sustained, a little fact the Conservatives will not tell you when they plan £8 billion in tax cuts.

Doctors stop decrying our NHS you are frightening our patients. Without putting to fine a point on it I am a senior nurse with over 30 years experience, perhaps the doctor that said nurses work a 35 hour week and get paid overtime could point me in that direction, because I certainly do not get either. GPs have a reasonable case, but it does not have to be proved we know it and it certainly will not help GPs case if they take industrial action placing peoples lives at risk. Do it the right way TALK not STRIKE, if you cannot manage this then by all means hand in your notice and I hope it is accepted.
EM, UK

People have a free NHS service with dedicated doctors and nurses and they still moan

Sara B, UK

My husband is a doctor and I know first hand the pressures he and his colleagues face. Without the unnecessary paperwork and administration that takes up most of their time, they could devote enough time needed towards treating their patients. Inevitably this would reduce stress and fatigue - leading towards better patient care. People have a free NHS service with dedicated doctors and nurses and they still moan. They are entitled to strike and should do it more. If they lived anywhere else in the world, they would pay extensively for any treatment they ever received. It makes me very angry.
Sara B, UK

I don't think anyone here has suggested that taxes should go up to fund the NHS. Nor has anyone taken on board the point that PK (England) makes that GP's are not salaried employees but running small businesses. The solution to some of their problems must therefore be in their own hands. We all make choices; but some people have more choice than others, especially the educated ones who become doctors (or IT managers!). If you're a miner, you go on strike because you've no other choice. But a doctor?
Steve, UK

The entire NHS is overworked and underpaid, and needs the support that recent governments have been seemingly unwilling to give it. What kind of a country do we live in when people are refused medication because "it's too expensive"?
Antony, UK

There has to be some other way to resolve this problem

Sam, UK

Unfortunately doctors are overworked but they are in one of those professions where you just can't go on strike. People's lives are involved here. There has to be some other way to resolve this problem.
Sam, UK

Yes they should take industrial action. The service they provide is poor and that is due to the way in which the public have been encouraged to expect total access. For me the best way to get the service improved is to charge a nominal sum of say £10 per visit which patients must pay - that would cut down the number of patients and help pay for the service.
Bill Thompson, UK

Any GPs who want to come to help us in Canada are very welcome. We are severely underdoctored in most areas. Doesn't sound as though it has improved much since I left for Canada!
John, Canada

We should remember one firm principle of labour, that every worker reserves the right to withdraw his or her labour at ANY time. If you need to improve conditions, then fight for these improvements.
Nigel Maskell, Britain

They are supposed to be professionals whose first priority is to look after people

Phil W, UK

I sympathise with the doctors' problems, but they are supposed to be professionals whose first priority is to look after people, and not take this kind of action. Most of the rest of us would like to work just 35 hours a week as well, but it doesn't happen with most staff feeling lucky to have a job - with many employers exploiting this job insecurity.
Phil W, UK - currently in the USA

I have worked in the NHS for over 25 yrs as a nurse, midwife, and General Practice Nurse and now work in management on 'the other side of the fence'.(Hoping to get other managers to listen to how IT REALLY IS- and realising they do not want to know)These experiences allow me to say with much authority that many Doctors have worked for years doing a job they love working long hours with little or no financial or human resource support from managers who can only see the balance sheet at the end of March. Managers do not give one damn about the individual patient that Doctors have to deal with daily because they never have to see them or face the reality of dealing with someone who needs help and who could be helped, but cannot be, because of bad management and inadequate funding their hand are tied. Much money is spent on monitoring their performance and having others who monitor them and on and on it goes...a lot of wasted money that should be invested in patient care.
Disheartened, England

I am a Consultant Surgeon in my 40s, and work five 10-12 hour days per week for the NHS, plus most Saturday mornings and in addition have on-call nights and weekends, and also frequent call backs on nights and weekends when supposed to be off-duty. Plus more and more admin work, teaching, training and outside committee work. The reward for this - not the £12.50 per hour it averages, but seeing my patients get better (usually). However, it would be nice to be able to see my growing family occasionally and to be able to afford a holiday now and again - instead of trying to keep up to date by attending conferences at my own expense. Perhaps, EM, we and our GP colleagues should also just work shifts and be paid 'overtime' as our nursing colleagues are?
Mike, UK

All the doctor-bashing in the media is part of this process

Amir Ketabchi, UK

I speak as a medical student and I have to say I have been greatly encouraged by what I've read here so far. Thank God that most people see the truth i.e that a shamelessly anti-doctor government is trying to blame doctors for the shortcomings of the moribund NHS which started with Thatcher in the 80s. All the doctor-bashing in the media is part of this process, i.e to undermine the natural support people have for their doctors.

Doctors work very hard (as borne out by the contributors who have doctors as partners etc and watch them work their guts out everyday), and the Government has relied on their goodwill for years. Well no more. Doctors should become more militant and stop the rot whereby a doctor's time is now cheaper than a plumber's. If this carries on I will leave to work in the US where a real meritocracy means doctors are rewarded properly. Then all the taxpayers' money spent to train me (and many other medical students who are worried about their futures) will be lost to the country. You try and tell politicians that doctor-bashing is not a terribly clever way of sorting out the NHS, but it's like banging your head against a brick wall. Oh and EM, UK the "senior nurse": shame on you.
Amir Ketabchi, UK

I work in a busy hospital. I have TWICE fallen asleep while taking history from a patient as I was so tired working long hours repeatedly. Is this safe?
Junior Doctor, UK

The British public gets the health service it deserves

J, NHS doctor, UK

Judging by some of the less than sympathetic comments, I am forced to conclude that the British public gets the health service it deserves, a bad one. And do not believe that shoddy service is the prerogative of the public services. I have complaints about supermarkets (overcharging), banks (ditto), building societies (miscalculated interest, lost tax certificates), insurance companies (delayed payments) and so it goes on. Most of these organisations blame the IT. Watch out, Andy, maybe you're not up to it, try medicine if it's that easy.
J, NHS doctor, UK

I don't understand Andy's gripe. I've worked in IT for six years now and have never been expected to work 12+ hour days as a matter of course. Yes, I've done an occasional super-day but if you're treated so badly then look for another job. You're in one of the few skilled areas where you can pick and choose.
Nick T, UK

Doctors have the right to strike like everyone else. The trouble is, whenever employees in a service industry like teaching, transport or medicine to name a few, want to air their grievances they often have to resort to industrial action before those above care to listen to them.
Hazel, UK

Cure patients. Refuse paperwork. Everyone but purposeless bureaucrats will be happier.
Nigel Rees, Briton in USA

The answer is not the typical left-wing "tax the rich and spend freely". Without radical reform the extra money will only be spent on more surveys, middle management, forms to fill in and analysing the societal mix of each surgery. What is needed is less form-filling, more doctors and less managers, a flat fee to see a GP at all (even if only a notional amount) so people who go to the GP are more likely to actually have something wrong rather than wanting a free prescription for an aspirin. Basically discourage the time-wasters and provide longer slots for those that really need attention.
Karl Peters, UK

The NHS is in terminal decline, the real situation is that doctors are leaving the NHS in their hundreds. The government are running scared, offering small sums of money to stop doctors retiring early. The population of this country should be very worried because in 10 years time there will not be a national health service. You only need to try to find an NHS dentist or look back 10 years and you will see that medical services are going the way of dentistry and optics. GP`s are right in their actions, after all they are only taking action to help people who cannot afford private health care to be able to obtain good quality care and decent length appointments. I think the sooner doctors leave the NHS, the sooner people will realise how good they had it and how the government agenda has always been to destroy a health service which drains money away from their war chest.
John, UK

We need to stop pretending we can have European levels of social welfare with American levels of taxation

Guy Chapman, UK

Why should the lottery not fund the NHS to the tune of a million a week? Simple. Lottery tickets are voluntary, and the poor spend proportionally more of their income on the lottery than the rich. As such replacing general taxation with lottery funding is regressive - and is the reason the original lottery was stopped. The NHS needs more money, and we need to stop pretending we can have European levels of social welfare with American levels of taxation.
Guy Chapman, UK

On a general note we have a government in power who thinks that the electorate will put up with anything. I'm fully behind the doctors, just as I was behind the fuel protestors; my only surprise is that a walk-out didn't happen earlier. If our only response is the typical British retort, "Well .... what can you do?" we'll all be worked to death. The public as a whole have the ability to show their dissatisfaction at the ballot box.
Chris, UK

Doctors, nurses, teachers etc. in the State-run services in the UK always seem to be the ones that are whinging; perhaps it's time to start dismantling the "one-size-fits-all" bureaucracies of the NHS, comprehensive-schools etc, and replace them by a range of smaller, private institutions that can better respond both to the needs of their customers and their employees? My doctor always has plenty of time for me, but that's because he knows my [private] health-insurers are picking up the bill!
Geoff Mortenson, UK

Lets not confuse GPs and hospital Doctors. Chris UK has already identified the problem to be 'businessman comes first', which is exactly what the vast majority of GPs are - self-employed businesspeople. I'm sure 99.9% of GPs have the best interests of patients at heart, so surely improving record-keeping and the quality of service via performance management is something they agree is essential not optional? They should be working with others in the NHS to find the time to do this, such as using more highly trained nurses and therapists. Unfortunately, for some that may cause a drop in practice income, so they lose out financially. Perhaps if more took up the option to be salaried GPs via the Personal Medical Services scheme, they'd be beter off.
PK, England

The Government is doing what it can to help

Krysia, UK

I understand the doctors' frustration at the shortage in resources and the long work hours. However, I don't understand how these well educated people think that taking industrial action is going to solve the problems. They need to stop moaning and get on with it. Everyone has to work hard, and the Government is doing what it can to help.
Krysia, UK

Medical professionals work extremely hard and I believe they deserve more reward - financially and through greater respect in the community. We cannot take their service for granted because it is so valuable. They listen to your problems, so once in a while, take the time to listen to theirs!
Frank, Australia

I am a senior nurse with over 30 years experience. Nurses could have walked out many times due to poor pay and working conditions a hundred times worse than you GPs in your secular little surgeries, but we did not. Why? Because we put our patients first. Stop giving our profession a bad name. Most of you do not even have to go out on call now in the night - you have locums to do it for you. So you have to fill in a bit of paper - so what? Grow up.
EM, UK

We are all expecting more and more from our support services

Charlie, England

The problem here is that we are all expecting more and more from our support services (e.g. doctors). However we are unwilling to pay for it. We cannot have it both ways. We have to decide what we want and accept the consequences of that decision.
Charlie, England

NO question that we are overworked. I have just looked at my practice consultation rates over the last 10 years. They have risen by 85%. And the numbers seen is only a small factor because now each consultation is frequently a list instead of an item, attended by extensive record keeping, and often by many repetitive letters, investigations results and instructions from hospitals. The weight of consultation has risen 3-4 fold.
Steve Edmunds, UK

The NHS has run on the goodwill of its doctors for decades. It used to be the case that junior doctors were overworked but with seniority or going into general practice, things became a little easier. Now there is no let-up until retirement. Good luck to them, there comes a time when enough is enough, and that time is now.
Brian W, UK

We cannot take their service for granted because it is so valuable.

Frank, Australia

Medical professionals work extremely hard and I believe they deserve more rewards, financially and through greater respect in the community. We cannot take their service for granted because it is so valuable. They listen to your problems, so once in a while take the time to listen to theirs!
Frank, Australia

I understand the doctors' frustration at the shortage in resources and the long work hours. However, I don't understand how these well educated people think that taking industrial action is going to solve the problems.They need to stop moaning and get on with it. Everyone has to work hard.
Krysia, UK

Doctors slave away for many years in medical school, then as junior doctors with little pay or appreciation. In other careers, little training is needed before people are paid very high salaries. Doctors work every day saving lives, or at least improving them, and it is ironic that cigarette companies, for instance, who make their business endangering people's health, should be paid so much more. Doctors deserve better pay and better working conditions. No-one wants to be treated by a tired doctor, and it is unfair on the doctor and their families. I am not in a medical profession but would like my health in the hands of someone who is happy to be helping.
Emma T, Australia

Absolutely not! Doctors perform an essential service. If they go out on strike, people in dire need of surgeries or life-saving medical procedure will die or be crippled for life. Strikes should not be allowed in essential services. I quote Calvin Coolidge, US President in the 1920s, who said: "There is no right against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, any time."
Jeff, US

My GP retired a few months ago. When I visited her I was made to feel like I was a hindrance. No time was spent with me and I was railroaded out of the surgery as soon as possible. She failed to even acknowledge that I had asthma! I believed that this was simply because she was overworked. My new GP is friendly, spends time with me, is very helpful and knowledgeable. Totally different to my previous GP even though she works in the same surgery with the same conditions. Pay should be linked to performance just as in most other industries. A customer satisfaction survey should also form an element of GPs' salaries.
Helen, UK

The plight of doctors and teachers is a consequence of the 'businessman comes first' attitude, where the interests of those actually doing the work are worth nothing compared to the fat-cat bureaucrats in charge. Unfortunately, I don't believe anything short of industrial action will alert people to the abysmal working conditions forced onto these people by a government whose primary interest is the businessman.
Chris, UK

I'm married to a surgeon. He is at work by 7.30am and leaves at 7pm. When he is on call (once every 5 days) he has to stay in the hospital, often operating during the night as well as the next day. He is shouted at by patients who are angry at being kept waiting. He's shattered when he comes home and just falls asleep. His basic pay is less than mine as a senior nurse. Why does he do it? He's beginning to wonder. I totally support the GPs, and wish the BMA would find a backbone and support the doctors.
Julia

Why should we fund it even more?

Sha, UK

I refer to Dr Sion Williams. Yes the NHS does need an injection of funds, but come on, I personally pay £143.00 per month and my husband pretty much contributes the same amount. Why should we fund it even more? The amount of money that is wasted on stupid projects such as the Millennium Dome would have give the NHS a massive boost. How about the lottery funding a million a week for a start?
Sha, UK

I think it's fair enough for the doctors to protest but it would have been far better for them to set a specific day for the protest, saying they were not taking appointments on that date, rather than have people turning up for appointments they made weeks beforehand.
Selina, UK

Andy, I see you choose to work long hours as an IT manager. If you make a mistake a computer might crash. If a doctor gets it wrong someone's life might be ruined
Stephen, UK

Stop blaming GPs for things that go wrong

Sharon Chitty, England

I am married to a GP who undertook five years medical training with no financial help whatsoever. After qualification he was based for another seven years in hospitals working on average 72 hour week-ends and 13 hour days for very little pay. Our first child didn't recognise him. Eventually moving into group practice working equally long hours, more training, constantly updating his skills and being given more and more targets to meet by people who have no idea of what it is like to be a "Family Doctor". My husband prides himself in providing the best service for his patients, as do his partners. Stop blaming GPs for things that go wrong, look a little deeper at what your elected government is demanding of them.
Sharon Chitty, England

I am a GP at the end of my tether. Everything is dumped on us, always with the expectation that we will pick up the pieces uncomplainingly. Patients must not suffer! This justifies the Labour Government treating us like bonded slaves. Multiple new management initiatives hardly thought out, oppress and waste so much valuable time; time which could be spent on longer consultations. It may not seem so, but there is a massive amount of stress among us doctors, and our dedicated staff. The extra money promised to GPs never reaches us, but is creamed off by debt-ridden hospitals. We need help, not the punishment being meted out by power-hungry politicians.
R, UK

I think the Government should make doctors who are educated in Britain and who gain their qualifications in this country work only for the NHS for at least ten years. That way we will not lose out on the training required for new doctors.
Annette Hunter, Scotland

The politicians should strike for a day. We wouldn't miss them.
Ian, England

I'm a doctor who left the NHS to work in research. I love it! Doctors should be included in European working hours legislation (they are currently excluded) and work 35 hours per week. Why not? We all deserve a life, and my message to doctors who don't like the NHS is simple - leave it. Don't just whinge. Market forces will then dictate that the system is changed - big time.
Simon, UK

Doctors on strike, the very idea fills me with dread

William Croft, UK

Doctors on strike, the very idea fills me with dread. Displeasing as I find the prospect of an understaffed health service on strike, if the NHS is diseased and no-one else will treat it then doctors must take action and strike until it is well again.
William Croft, UK

I am a GP and feel the system cannot cope with the ever increasing demands made on it. We are criticised for not offering the service the patients have been told is available. There is a gap between expectations and reality. If reality is to be met then more doctors will be required. This unfortunately will take not only money but time. It takes at least nine years to train a GP and there are none available off the shelf. If Society wants an efficient service will well doctors it may have to dig deep into its pockets.
Rob Denney, UK

I don't even know who my GP is supposed to be. Each time I make an appointment to go to the doctors I have to wait 10-14 days for an appointment, I never see the same GP and I end up cancelling the appointment and turning up as an emergency as it is the only way I can get treated. GPs might as well take industrial action - it's not like we get to see them anyway, so what's one more day?
Lisa, London

Worked out at an hourly rate, junior doctors get paid about £5 an hour

Pete, UK

With reference to "Andy the IT Manager" from the UK, I am truly stunned at your opinion. How many people's lives does your job risk every day . . . and how much do you get paid? I'll guarantee that you get paid vastly more than a junior doctor (my wife is a junior doctor). Worked out at an hourly rate, junior doctors get paid about £5 an hour. You may work hard Andy, but at least you are paid a salary that matches the hours you work, let alone the responsibility that comes with it (like saving lives if you are a doctor) and if you were that busy, you wouldn't have had a few spare moments to be adding to this website!
Pete, UK

Tired and overworked doctors can cost lives.
Andrew, UK

Andy, UK, you've worked 16 days in a row, long days too. You're tired. You make a mistake. What happens? Some backups get deleted. Perhaps a machine crashes. A company somewhere loses some money. If you're a doctor, it could be you inject the wrong drug, or you miss the obvious symptom of some disease. Perhaps someone dies as a result. In any case, I fail to see why, in 2001, anyone has to work 16 long days in a row and be on call 24 hours a day. Do people have lives outside work or what?
Rob, UK

Doctors are like teachers in many ways. As soon as anyone starts looking at their performance, they start complaining like mad. Most GP's don't even have to do out of hour visits as they refuse to come out unless you're dying.
It's a pity they didn't see it fit to protest when the Tories where in power, after all the years of under-funding lies squarely with them.
Steven Douglas, Scotland

The fact that doctors are striking shows the awful state the NHS is in

John, UK

The fact that doctors are striking shows the awful state the NHS is in. But what are they complaining about - paperwork! The government doesn't need to throw more of our cash at the NHS, it needs reform, root and branch, to deliver high quality primary healthcare without the bureaucracy.
John, UK

Of course GPs are right to make their case heard. It's unrealistic to expect anyone to consistently work such long hours. And yes, we do get the NHS we pay for - time to raise direct taxes to pay not just for proper health care, but also other social services.
Fred, UK

You people pay for the NHS you get

Dr Sion Williams, UK

Every GP I know and every hospital doctor I know sees the NHS as being underfunded. If you have to wait months for an investigation or outpatient appointment, remember, you need to pay more tax. You people pay for the NHS you get. Without higher tax it's just rearranging the system. It needs a radical injection of money. Pretending otherwise is absolute nonsense.
Dr Sion Williams, UK

It's Tuesday, I've just worked sixteen days without a break. I start at 7:30 and usually finish around 6:30. I am on call 24 hours a day from the UK and the Far East. What am I? A doctor? No I'm an IT manager. Doctors grow up, we all have to work hard, there's nothing special about you.
Andy, UK

As long as the middle class in middle England keep wanting their tax cuts we will never be able to afford the NHS or the schools we need.
Gerry, Scotland

This issue will become catastrophic and irreversible in 5 years time unless resolved now

Charlotte Allen, UK

What right do we have to criticise genuine mistakes doctors make whilst working when we push them to the limit of exhaustion? Having a GP as a father I have seen the impact this has on families. How dare we take advantage of those who choose to spend their career saving and improving the lives of often unappreciative patients. The idea of huge salaries is also unjust - NHS doctors are not paid to match the responsibility they must hold nor the hours they work. It is time to address the working conditions of GP's; This issue will become catastrophic and irreversible in 5 years time unless resolved now. After all, we are hardly making medicine an attractive career choice to university applicants are we?
Charlotte Allen, UK

I've been struck by the absence of any interviews with a government health minister on UK news bulletins. If the Government believes there is no problem they should say so; if they accept there is one, they should say what they propose doing about it.
Ronald, UK

Most doctors do not want to take industrial action because they are more concerned about the effect this will have on their patients. However the Government has increased patient expectations without providing the resources to meet them. There have been numerous initiatives including revalidation, clinical governance, national service frameworks but no extra time for doctors or nurses to take stock of the changes and develop accordingly. Unfortunately the Government notices that we are too soft and takes advantage by piling on more work. Any credit goes to the Government and any criticism for failure to meet these standards to GPs and nurses!
Andy, UK

What about the nurses who are the backbone of the NHS?

S. Messenger, UK

The doctors in this country do have it hard. However, what about the nurses who are the backbone of the NHS? They have been underpaid and overworked for years and are leaving en mass. It's time we looked after them and rewarded them with the correct pay, hours, etc that they deserve. I work in an office earning more that a trained, professional nurse who is responsible for life and death situations. Surely this cannot be right.
S. Messenger, UK

The pressure doctors are under is reflected in the service they give to their patients. I have to wait 10 days to see my GP about a condition for which I am being treated but which has worsened. We cannot predict when we are going to become ill and in many cases the condition is very much worse by the time we are able to see our GPs.
Peter Haig, Wales

We prosecute lorry drivers who work less hours than doctors because they can fall asleep at the wheel and might kill someone. Why should doctors who make life and death decisions have to work more hours than this. Something is fundamentally wrong here.
Andy, UK

Doctors are overworked and this can only lead to problems

Tom Bradley, England

Time and time again this Government has promised changes to improve the NHS. Time and time again they have let this country down. Doctors are overworked and this can only lead to problems. We need more GPs, we need to have longer consultation times. How can anyone expect a doctor to make an effective diagnosis in 5 Minutes?
Tom Bradley, England

If the medical profession was a little less arrogant and a little more respectful of the people they serve, I'd have more sympathy for them. As it is, I think they should get a reality check.
Mark M. Newdick, USA/ UK

Yes, I think that they are entirely justified in what they are doing. I am engaged to a junior hospital doctor (i.e. doctor in training) and have seen the number of hours that they have to work. Imagine, working a whole day hard at work (and that may mean over 12 hours), and then coming home tired, but also being on-call. You may be telephoned at any time in the next 12 hours, you may even be called back into work! I think that all professionals have a right to a social/ private life. If the teachers can demand a 35 hour week, what about the doctors?
Anon, UK

I once went to A&E in acute pain, and was seen by a doctor who had been on duty for 36 hours. He diagnosed a trivial condition and went off-duty to be replaced by a fresh doctor, who immediately conducted tests, diagnosed correctly and admitted me to hospital forthwith. The reassurance of knowing that an alert doctor and a hospital bed are available in an emergency is worth its weight in gold. Good luck to the doctors in improving their conditions, though even immediately increasing our allocation of GDP devoted to the Health Service wouldn't help if doctors can't be recruited or facilities can't be built overnight. But then, how long have doctors been complaining about their working conditions?
Andy Millward, UK

Doctors need a pay cut not a pay rise!
AJ Perry, UK

Last time I saw a doctor I was in and out within 5 minutes

John B, UK

Last time I saw a doctor I was in and out within 5 minutes. The doctor in question had a very thick accent and I didn't understand a word she said. All she had time to do was scribble a prescription and show me the door. In the light of this it doesn't seem far-fetched to say that doctors are overworked. Industrial action is clearly undesirable in the medical profession but the Government has made it fairly clear that it won't listen to reasoned discussion, so what else is left?
John B, UK

If firemen can strike I don't see why doctors can't do the same. Either action puts lives at risk. However if anyone suffers as a result of this they will soon lose public sympathy. I agree that they get a rough deal and I am sure they appreciate the risk they will be taking if they strike.
A. Duncan, UK

Surely everyone has the right to fair working hours and conditions, particularly in Britain where we currently work the longest hours in Europe? I admit that I find it annoying that on the rare occasions I would like a doctor's appointment I have to book days in advance. However the solution to this is not to work our doctors to death but to reduce the number of visits by those in the community with hypochondria, of which there are many in the Midlands!
Rebecca Southwell, UK

What else are you supposed to do when nobody listens?
P, UK