HEALTH Secretary Jeremy Hunt, the MP for Haslemere, has blasted the British Medical Association (BMA) for its “extraordinary” decision to launch a second wave of strike action next week.

Negotiations on a new NHS junior doctors’ contract failed on Monday and the BMA has announced a 24-hour walkout from 8am on Tuesday, January 12, with a further 48-hour strike beginning at 8am on Tuesday, January 26.

On both of these occasions junior doctors will still be providing emergency care, however on Wednesday, February 10 there will be an unprecedented full withdrawal of labour between 8am and 5pm.

In a letter to the BMA council chairman Dr Mark Porter, the Conservative Health Secretary said he was “very disappointed” to hear of the decision to initiate strike action.

The South West Surrey MP described the decision to strike as “extraordinary” and claimed the BMA had not fully considered his revised offer.

Addressing Dr Porter, Mr Hunt wrote: “I believe we made good progress in the negotiations and given the many areas of common ground it cannot be appropriate to put patient safety at risk with a series of potentially damaging strikes without seeing these negotiations through in full.”

Mr Hunt also expressed hopes the strike could still be suspended to allow negotiations to be concluded.

But health campaigner Dr Louise Irvine who stood against Mr Hunt at last year’s General Election, claimed the doctors were going on strike because of the “Government’s intransigence” over watering down protections against them having to work excessive hours and the redefinition of anti-social hours at evenings and weekends as normal hours,

That would enable hospitals to make junior doctors work even more antisocial hours than they already do, she claimed

The strike action is likely to lead to non-emergency operations and hospital appointments being cancelled.

Royal Surrey County Hospital, in Guildford said it would “provide a safe level of care for all of patients” during the planned strike. A statement said:“We would like to assure the community we are working hard to put in place a robust contingency plan to ensure the minimum disruption to services.”