'Significant risk to patients' warns Suffolk and Essex NHS boss as nurses plan bank holiday strike

The latest round of nurses strikes will “significantly increase the risk to patients,” a hospital chief executive has said.

Nick Hulme, chief executive of Ipswich and Colchester hospitals, said cancer patients will face greater risks as care could be delayed.

Nurses from the UK's largest union, the Royal College of Nursing, have voted to reject a government pay offer and plan to stage further strikes over the first May bank holiday with staff from intensive care, emergency departments and cancer wards.

The government said the result will be "hugely concerning" for patients.

Speaking to Radio 4, Nick Hulme said: “If there is a delay to cancer care, some delays won’t cause significant effects, but there are many people who have been waiting far too long for care and this will only exacerbate that risk.

“People are tired, there has been a huge amount of goodwill, there is always a lot of goodwill relied upon when delivering health care and that has been stretched during the industrial action previously from the nurses and now from the junior doctors.”

Mr Hulme said strike action being coordinated by doctors and nurses could “cause a risk I can’t quite comprehend”.

It comes as paramedics and other NHS workers from Unison voted to accept the offer, which includes a one-off payment of around £2,500 and a 5% salary increase in 2023/24.

The Society of Radiographers has also announced its members rejected the same pay offer, and will ballot its members on strike action.

What has the government said?

Mr Barclay said it was “hugely disappointing” that the RCN had rejected the pay deal.

He said: “Their decision to escalate strike action with no exemptions, based on a vote from a minority of members, is also hugely concerning.

“The NHS staff council, which recommended this offer, covers a number of trade unions who are continuing to vote, and I hope this offer secures the support of a majority of members.”

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