GMB ambulance workers in Bucks on strike for second time today

Ambulance workers belonging to the GMB Union in Bucks are on strike today (Wednesday, January 11), with paramedics, emergency care assistants, call handlers and other staff staging a picket at Stoke Mandeville Hospital.

Workers voted to strike over the government’s imposed four per cent pay award, which the GMB calls “another massive real terms pay cut”.

South Central Ambulance Service (SCAS), which serves Bucks, Berks, Hants and Oxon, says there are just over 200 GMB members out of around 4,500 staff across all SCAS services.

As a result, the impact will mainly be on the non-emergency patient transport service, but there may be some action within 999 services.

A statement on the SCAS website reads: “We are working closely with our local and regional GMB union representatives and staff to minimise as far as possible, the impact of such action on our patients.”

GMB representatives have agreed the essential service its members will continue to provide (known as derogations), including patient transport services, ambulance crews and 999/111 control centres.

GMB has agreed that 75 per cent of its members who are due on shift today will continue to work to support essential services within control centres.

GMB national secretary Rachel Harrison said: “GMB cancelled a planned strike over the Christmas period to say thank you to the public for their incredible support.

“It also allowed time for the government to talk to us about pay, but ministers have dithered and postured, wasting valuable time.

"To end this dispute, GMB needs a concrete offer to help resolve the NHS’s crushing recruitment and retention crisis.

"The public expects the government to treat this dispute seriously – it’s time they got on with it.”

SCAS says its 999 and 111 services are very busy at the moment, regardless of strike action, and it urges people only to call 999 for life-threatening or serious emergencies, such as a person unresponsive and/or not breathing, symptoms of stroke, severe chest pains, breathlessness, major blood loss or serious burns.

For all other healthcare needs, people are asked to use NHS 111 online.