Lansley: 'Public won't understand BMA action'
The Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley, says that he does not think "the public will remotely understand" the reasons behind a series of days of action agreed by doctors in protest at changes to their pensions.
Speaking on The World at One on BBC Radio 4, Mr Lansley said: "I think the public completely undertand that there is a need across the public services for pension reform and that the NHS cannot be exempt from that."
And he added that he saw no reason why members of the British Medical Association (BMA) "should be putting patients to any degree of inconvenience or risk" and that they already have "a pension scheme, frankly, which anybody in the private sector or in many parts of the public sector would be very glad to have".
Members of the BMA voted by a large majority in favour of action. The first day will be 21 June, when staff will only treat emergencies and patients in need of care.
30 May 2012
- From the section Health