NHS staff staging four-hour strike over pay
Thousands of NHS workers, including nurses, midwives and ambulance staff, have begun a four-hour strike.
Workers from six trade unions are taking part, which will disrupt some NHS services - although urgent and emergency care will be unaffected.
The action - from 07:00 to 11:00 BST - mainly affects England, while some staff in Northern Ireland are involved.
Trade unions want a 1% pay rise for all NHS staff, but the government has said the proposal would cost too much.
Ahead of the strike, England's chief nursing officer Jane Cummings said "robust plans" had been put in place and patient safety "was a priority".
A spokesman for the Department of Health said it was "disappointed that trade unions are taking industrial action".
"NHS staff are our greatest asset, and we've increased the NHS budget to pay for over 12,500 more clinical staff since 2010.
"We cannot afford a pay rise in addition to increments - which disproportionately reward the highest earners - without risking frontline jobs," the spokesman added.
Unison said the action - the first strike by NHS staff over pay in more than 30 years - would send a "clear message" to the government.
Union leaders have said their members will be providing "life and limb" cover during the strike, meaning 999 calls will be answered and A&E units will remain open.
However, hospital outpatient appointments, community clinics and some routine operations could be affected.
The Royal College of Midwives, which is taking action for the first time in its history, has said services for women giving birth will be unaffected. Instead, their members are likely to target antenatal and postnatal care.
|Who is taking part?|
|Union||Staff groups||Number of members|
|Unison||Nurses, healthcare assistants, ambulance staff, porters and admin||250,000 in England|
|GMB||Nurses, healthcare assistants, ambulance staff, porters, admin workers and cleaners||22,000 in England and Northern Ireland|
|Unite||Nurses, healthcare assistants, ambulance staff, porters and admin||92,000 in England and Northern Ireland|
|Royal College of Midwives||Midwives||22,000 in England|
|UCATT||Maintenance staff||480 in England|
|British Association of Occupational Therapists||Occupational therapists||24,000|
Doctors and dentists are not involved.
The walkout will be followed by four days of working-to-rule from Tuesday.
As well as the RCM, there are another five unions involved in the strike in England - Unison, Unite, GMB, UCATT and the British Association of Occupational Therapists. Between them they have about 400,000 members, including porters, cleaners and administration staff.
In Northern Ireland, members of Unite and GMB are involved.
Ministers in England have awarded NHS staff a 1% increase, but only for those without automatic progression-in-the-job rises.
These, designed to reward professional development, are given to about half of staff, and are worth 3% a year on average.
From the picket: Dominic Hughes, BBC News
A boisterous noisy picket outside the Victorian facade of the old Manchester Royal infirmary has been made up of nursing assistants porters paramedics and for the first time in their history midwives.
Plenty of cars are tooting their support as they pass on Manchester's busy Oxford Road.
Inside the hospital some services will be affected and a number of midwives have already left the picket to go to staff a ward that was short on numbers.
So this is a symbolic strike but one that displays the real anger of health workers over pay.
An independent pay review board had said the 1% increase should be across the board.
It was implemented in full in Scotland. Northern Ireland has yet to make a decision on pay, while Wales did the same as England but did give extra to the lowest paid. Some unions are balloting their Welsh members about action there.
Christina McAnea, head of health at Unison, said the offer in England was a "disgrace".
"The fact that so many unions representing a range of NHS workers are taking action or preparing to join future actions should send a clear message to the government," she said.
"The NHS relies on the good will of its workers but we know that a demotivated workforce is bad for patients. The government needs to start negotiating with us and reconsider their pay policy."
RCM chief executive Cathy Warwick added: "At a time when MPs are set for a 10% pay hike, we're told that midwives don't deserve even a below-inflation 1% rise. And politicians wonder why the public does not afford them more respect.
"It feels to a great many people, including midwives, that there is one rule for them and another rule for everybody else."
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