Resident doctors v Wes Streeting: How a potential deal broke down, as BMA lead says Streeting must dial down “name calling”

Health Secretary Wes Streeting needs to stop trying to “politic” his way out of the dispute with resident doctors and focus on negotiating, the doctor tasked with leading talks with the government says.BMA Resident Doctors Committee (RDC) chair Jack Fletcher made the comments to The BMJ as resident doctors in England wrapped up their 15th strike since 2023.1Fletcher said that before the walkout negotiations with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) had been going well.“We were moving in the right direction,” he said.The government’s latest offer included pay structure reform, reimbursement of royal college exam fees, contract reform for locally employed doctors, and up to 4500 more specialty training places over the next three years (including 1000 this April).Looking back on those conversations, Fletcher said that discussions about jobs and training numbers and trying to tackle the “gig economy”—which many doctors outside of training find themselves working in—were...