Health Secretary Wes Streeting was on Tuesday set to begin formal talks with junior doctors in a bid to resolve a long-running pay dispute.
The British Medical Association (BMA) has held 11 rounds of strike action in the past 20 months, causing severe disruption to NHS services.
The union is seeking a 35 per cent pay rise to restore a real-term fall in income since 2008 but insist that a deal could involve multi-year pay increases.
Mr Streeting said that striking a compromise with the BMA would be difficult due to the “terrible economic circumstances” inherited from the Conservatives but that “there is a deal to be done”.
“Strikes have had a significant cost to patients, staff, and the NHS. Serious work is now under way to finally bring them to an end,” he said.
The talks are expected to conclude by August 16, in time for the BMA’s executive meeting.
Mediated negotiations between the Conservative Government and the BMA fell apart in the run up to the General Election, prompting the union to walk out just a week before polling day.
Mr Streeting held two initial meetings with the BMA after Labour’s election victory and has pledged to “change the way junior doctors are treated in the NHS”.
Following the first meeting on July 9, Mr Streeting said both sides had shown a “willingness to negotiate”.
“Both sides have shown willingness to negotiate and we are determined to do the hard work required to find a way through,” he said.
NHS bosses have said that ending the dispute will be key to reducing the elective waiting list, which currently stands at 7.6 million.
Dr Vivek Trivedi and Dr Robert Laurenson, co-chairmen of the BMA’s junior doctors committee, also hailed the meeting as a “positive first step”.
Fresh talks were also set to be held this afternoon between the Department for Transport (Dft) and the union representing train drivers to resolve a long-running pay dispute.
It will be the first meeting between the union and the department since April last year, with previous talks held through the Rail Delivery Group.
Aslef’s general secretary Mick Whelan stressed it was an “initial” meeting, adding: “We hope, with a new Government in place, that we can have constructive talks to get a positive resolution that works for train drivers, who have not had an increase in salary for five years, since 2019, and will help get our railway back on track.”
