Confirmed: EMAS ambulance workers in Northamptonshire to stage two 24-hour strikes in December

Health service union leaders have announced two dates when Northamptonshire ambulance workers will walk out in a strike over pay and conditions.

Paramedics, emergency care assistants, call handlers and other staff working for East Midlands Ambulance Service (EMAS) will strike for 24 hours from 6am on December 21 and December 28 after ballots overwhelmingly backed the GMB’s call for action. The union says its representatives will meet with NHS trusts including Northampton General Hospital and Kettering General Hospital to discuss requirements for ‘life and limb’ cover.

NHS workers who are members of Unison will carry on working as the union’s ballots at EMAS failed to reach the threshold of a 50 percent turnout among its members required by law. Leaders of a third union, Unite, said its members had also backed strike action by up to 92 percent but has confirmed action will affect only West Midlands, North West and North East ambulance services.

GMB workers at nine ambulance services voted to strike over the government’s imposed four per cent pay award which unions say is “another massive real terms pay cut”. National secretary, Rachel Harrison, said: “Ambulance workers – like other NHS workers – are on their knees.

“Demoralised and downtrodden, they’ve faced 12 years of Conservative cuts to the service and their pay packets, fought on the frontline of a global pandemic and now face the worst cost of living crisis in a generation. No one in the NHS takes strike action lightly – today shows just how desperate they are.

“This is as much about unsafe staffing levels and patient safety as it is about pay. A third of GMB ambulance workers think delays they’ve been involved with have led to the death of a patient.

“Something has to change or the service as we know it will collapse. GMB calls on the Government to avoid a winter of NHS strikes by negotiating a pay award that these workers deserve.”

Nearly 85 percent of GMB members at EMAS who voted were in favour of strike action with a fraction under 60 percent turning out. Nearly 95 percent voted in favour of action short of a strike.

Unison has confirmed services in London, Yorkshire, the North West, North East and South West will be affected by strike action on the same days as GMB workers wall out. But it confirmed plans to begin reballoting around 13,000 NHS staff working for ten trusts, including EMAS.

Unison’s head of health, Sara Gorton, said: “The government will only have itself to blame if there are strikes in the NHS before Christmas.

“Ambulance staff and their health colleagues don’t want to inconvenience anyone. But ministers are refusing to do the one thing that could prevent disruption – that’s start genuine talks about pay.

“Wages are too low to stop health workers quitting the NHS. As more and more hand in their notice, there are fewer staff left to care for patients. The public knows that’s the reason behind lengthy waits at A&E, growing ambulance delays, postponed operations and cancelled clinics.”