The junior doctors’ strike – what’s really new about it? | Jack Saunders

With the junior doctors' strike now back on, Jack Saunders takes a historical look at how NHS doctor 'militancy' has changed

Novelty has been a major theme in much of the coverage of the junior doctors' strike. Here was a group of middle-class professionals behaving, as Jeremy Hunt implied, like "trade union militants". Yet doctors have long used collective protest to shape the NHS and their role within it, and their different motivations reflect changing relationships and attitudes towards the health service.

For instance, in 1947, doctors contested plans for the new National Health Service, looking to retain their independent contractor status rather than becoming salaried employees. They threatened to boycott the new service if the government didn't retain "capitation", a practice where doctors were paid per registered patient.