Markus Andrews

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    Jake Berry’s defection to Reform leaves only one question for Badenoch – ‘who is leaving next?’

    The defection of Sir Jake Berry, a former Tory chairman, to Reform was a genuine shock last night.As Kemi Badenoch prepared to give a major speech just hours later on welfare reform, it left her looking increasingly lost and irrelevant.Already, there were questions over why she had chosen today of all days to deliver a major speech when the news was very much focused on migration and the mini-summit between Sir Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron, who would be grabbing the attention. But with Sir Jake’s defection, there would only ever be one subject anybody would ask her about at her press conference: “Who is leaving next?”Jake Berry, a former Conservative Party chairman, has joined Reform UK More

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    Voices: ‘No one outside the NHS will understand’: Doctors and their families defend strike action

    As resident doctors prepare for another walkout, doctors, NHS staff, and their families have hit back at criticism, taking to the Independent’s comments with passionate, first-hand accounts of life on the front line.Our wider community is sharply split over the upcoming industrial action and their demand for a 29 per cent pay rise. With one reader insisting that doctors “should be ashamed”.Amid the division, however, several medics defended the strike as a last resort after years of burnout, pay erosion and understaffing. Many noted that doctors face job insecurity, rising costs of training, and little respect from the public.While one parent recalled their son working 90+ hour weeks over the festive period, another said that the “greedy doctors” narrative was not just wrong but “heartbreaking”, and accused the government of breaking the NHS on purpose. But not everyone backed the British Medical Association’s decision to strike. One medic called the 29 per cent pay demand “excessive” and warned the walkout could further harm patient care.Here’s what they had to say:90-hour weeksThe gods were very kind to me, and I had three kids. All of them of similar intellect. My eldest son decided to carve a career in commerce, as did my daughter. My younger son, from the age of about fourteen, set his sights on the medical profession. 20+ years later, my younger son is now a consultant working in the NHS. My older son’s basic salary is circa 2.5 times that of my younger son. But he also gets quite substantial bonuses, a share issue at the end of each financial year and mainly works from home roughly 8–9 hours per day, 5 days per week.One might conclude from that anyone wanting to enter the medical profession as either a nurse or doctor must be utterly bonkers… But thank heaven they do!When my younger son was an ST1 (Speciality Trainee year 1) we were all sitting round the dinner table on Christmas Day, and it emerged that he had managed to get Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day off. Upon enquiring how he had managed this, his reply was to the effect: “I will take the pain when I go back.” It subsequently emerged that his first two weeks back were both 90 hours, and the third week was 93 hours. His observation about the 93 hours: “I wouldn’t want to see me after 93 hours.”TemplerDo you support the doctor’s strike? Share your thoughts in the comments.Looking back, I had it easyOur daughter went through the FY1/2 (foundation training), SHO (Senior House Officer), Reg, S/Reg, now an NHS Consultant and working for the first time in the one place…She had the same horrific working conditions as I did when training, but she had the EWTD (The European Working Time Directive ) to contend with – where they still worked crazy hours but the management couldn’t admit to being short-staffed, so getting any ‘overtime’ became extremely difficult…Looking back, I had it easy…ScoobytheDogNo one outside the NHS will understandI do not think that anyone outside the NHS will truly understand what it is like to be a resident doctor or appreciate the demands of the job. Five or six years of medical school, over £100k in debt, exam fees through your 20s and 30s, and training bottlenecks, not to mention the emotional labour and the responsibility of keeping people alive.In clinical years of medical school, we spend most of our days on the wards, essentially working unpaid. Medical school is exhausting, but it is worth the effort to become a doctor. In our final year, we are randomly allocated to work in any hospital in the United Kingdom to undertake two years of foundation training. This process does not consider one’s family commitments, relationships or grades in medical school.Whilst scheduled working hours are capped, there are weeks where one may be on the rota to work up to 72 hours. Of course, often people stay overtime due to staff shortages and workload. There are often too many patients and not enough doctors or nurses to cover the wards. Lunch breaks are often 10–15 minutes, or do not happen at all depending on the clinical picture.The emotional toll of seeing so much suffering, disease and death, and the weight of being the one to break bad news to patients and their loved ones, is heavy. Especially when consultations are rushed due to the volume of patients and staff shortages. Many times, your doctors are going through similar things in their personal lives – a parent with cancer, a brother that died the night before – but we put our own pain and humanity aside, we show up and we care for those that need us. The nature of the job makes burnout likely, and coupled with erosion of salaries and a decline in public respect for the hard work that doctors put in – is it a wonder people are leaving the NHS to pursue work as a doctor elsewhere? In other countries the job may be equally as emotionally demanding in a given moment, but the staffing in the hospitals will be better, the public will show you more respect, and you may work the same (or fewer!) hours for better pay, enjoying a better work-life balance – which is inevitably better for one’s own mental health and wellbeing. Not to mention, speciality training is shorter and less competitive abroad.The strikes and the pay rise are needed to boost morale and retain our home-grown talent. Unfortunately, many fail to realise that the more doctors that leave the NHS, the worse the staff shortages and waiting times get, and the harder it becomes for NHS staff to keep the NHS running, contributing further to staff burnout and staff leaving.BlueAlpacaThe fact people look at this as pure greed is heartbreakingI’ve seen family and friends who work as doctors, nurses, cleaners etc. struggling on a daily basis. Often working as a single doctor on a ward with countless patients and working unimaginable hours, which takes a massive toll on them – for how dangerous it is for them, on top of being treated horribly by patients and upper management alike.A comment I always see made is “doctors are not as nice as they used to be”, which I understand, but what is overlooked is that almost all NHS staff are overworked, on long shifts and have been treated horribly. The previous government made the NHS unmanageable (in my eyes on purpose), and staff are still working their hardest to fix it.The fact people look at this as pure greed is truly heartbreaking and it takes away from what these heroes are doing and putting up with on a daily basis. The government should be ashamed at trying to vilify the backbone of society for simply asking for better working standards.ConMakepeaceWell-deserved remunerationA lot of commentators obviously have no idea of current working conditions within the NHS. Doctors have multiple degrees and train for seven years before they start their practical training. “Junior doctor” is a deeply resented title by the way, as is “trainee doctor”.They then have further training to specialise – again, up to five years.They have ruinous professional subscriptions to the Royal College, MDU, BMA, etc.Many professional courses are paid for out of their own pockets. On-call is expected whatever your family circumstances – Christmas, Easter, school holidays. Doctors have had a 30 per cent wage cut. All they are seeking is a return to their well-deserved and earned remuneration.When a doctor reaches consultant level their wages cross the upper tax levels, which means they earn less than when they were training! Many of the doctors now training in the UK are planning on emigrating to other countries who pay their worth. The choice is yours – support your doctors or lose them and end up relying on poorly trained, unqualified physician associates. Believe me, you will really start whining then.YarblesI emigrated for moneyDoctors have always been exploited by the NHS and continue to be so. When I was an NHS consultant, pay was poor and then I lost two elevenths of that meagre salary to be graciously “allowed” to see private patients – but unbelievably was required to “give essentially the whole of my time to the NHS”! It took me only a short time to realise I was being treated as a “mere employee to do as I was told”, so I emigrated to the USA where I instantly earned (literally) TWENTY times as much as the NHS paid. I returned to Britain when I didn’t need to work again. It is a waste of effort to complain about NHS exploitation of its staff – just use your skills elsewhere. Bon chance! The ClaymoreAs a medic, I do not support this strikeAs a medic myself I am not in support of this strike or the requested pay rise, and I am ashamed of my own union (BMA). I do not like the way the NHS is going. It was always seen as a vocation, meaning that when you sign up for med school you know what you are taking on. But today it has so many problems caused by successive governments, and now this excessive pay request threatens its sustainability.FlossieDoctors have no job securityFew people realise that doctors have no job security. Following their two-year post-qualification training there are insufficient speciality training places available, and so they either have to scramble around to find one of the few short-term 12-month fellowship contracts or they are out of work. Added to that, they have to suffer the ignominy of having their assistants (Physician Associates) paid £10,000 per annum more than them. If that happened in teaching there would be outrage. All resident doctors are trying to do is fight for reasonable pay compared to PAs and job security. That doesn’t seem unreasonable to me.TuscanSPay should keep up with inflationEveryone deserves for their pay to have kept up with inflation since 2008. Everyone includes doctors and other NHS staff.DoctorSome of the comments have been edited for this article for brevity and clarity.Want to share your views? Simply register your details below. Once registered, you can comment on the day’s top stories for a chance to be featured. Alternatively, click ‘log in’ or ‘register’ in the top right corner to sign in or sign up.Make sure you adhere to our community guidelines, which can be found here. For a full guide on how to comment click here. More

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    Threat of Iranian attacks on UK now comparable to Russia, watchdog warns

    The threat of physical attacks by Iran on the UK now matches that of Russia, a watchdog has warned.Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee said the threat from Iran has increased “significantly” since 2022 and was “persistent” and “unpredictable”, in a report published on Thursday.Citing examples of 15 attempted murders or kidnappings of British nationals or UK residents by Iran, the committee said the physical threat posed by the country is “comparable with the threat posed by Russia”. Committee chairman Lord Beamish warned that Iran has “a high appetite for risk when conducting offensive activity” on foreign soil. “Its intelligence services are ferociously well-resourced with significant areas of asymmetric strength,” he said. Iran poses a ‘persistent’ and ‘unpredictable threat’ to the UK, Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee has found. (Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader via AP) More

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    Nadia Whittome: ‘I’m appalled by my party’s stance on trans rights’

    I’m appalled by my party’s stance on trans rights,” says Nadia Whittome, Labour MP for Nottingham East, over the ban on puberty blockers and the government’s response to the Supreme Court ruling on the definition of a woman.”At the current rate the government is going, our legacy will be continuing the rollbacks of trans rights that began with the Conservatives,” she adds. It’s a stark contrast to the previous Labour government, who “introduced the Equality Act, the Gender Recognition Act, paved the way for legalising same sex marriage and equalised the age of consent. Whatever other criticisms I and others may have of the last Labor government, it does have a record it can be proud of on LGBT+ rights”.It’s such a prominent topic, that Whittome’s been asked many times by her constituents if she thinks about leaving the party, or if the Labour party – founded by the trade union movement, as a party for the working class – no longer serves her and her beliefs. Yet, for Whittome, walking away would achieve little more than momentary gratification. Instead, from within the party she can push for change, while still representing the voices of her constituents, despite many telling her they won’t vote Labour again.It’s a heavy task for Whittome, yet it’s within her blood. “I’ve been an activist in my community since I was 16. It was growing up under Tory austerity and suffering the impact of that, which made me angry. Then I realised that we have power as individuals when we come together.”Whittome says she’s “really proud that this government’s pledged to half violence against women and girls,” but thinks that the increasing attacks on trans women in the news, the courts and on TV, which are “rooted in very archaic and misogynistic ideology,” are harmful for all women. “If we’re continuing to marginalise and scapegoat trans people, especially trans women, as a threat to other women, that means we’re not focusing on the real problem – men who are violent. The number of male violence offenses of stalking, harassment, sexual assault and domestic violence have grown by 37 per cent in the past five years. Trans people, particularly trans women, are far, far more likely to be victims,” she says.Now at 28, she’s served as an MP for six years, where she was the youngest MP aged just 22 until Samuel Carling took the title last year. Being such a young MP was “a baptism of fire” and an “alien world”, where she was “even more than most MPs, thrown in at the deep end”. Of course it was a “huge privilege and a huge responsibility,” as well. “I’d be given a huge mandate by my constituents, my community, to represent them, after campaigning on workers rights, a green deal, treating migrants and people seeking asylum with compassion and humanity, racial, social and economic justice”. At the time, Whittome says she got a lot of “you don’t have the life experience” and “you don’t know what you’re talking about”, which she felt meant she had to prove that wasn’t the case. Though she thinks young people do have a lot of life experience, as they grew up under austerity. “We lived the consequences of the political decisions of successive conservative governments. What better life experience than that?”. She recognises there’s “a vicious cycle of political parties not having a good political offer for young people,” as they dont’ vote as much as older people. “Then political parties feel that they don’t need to have a political offer for them,” and instead focus on their key voters, likely older people, who often are retired and have their own home. Though she adds the importance of having all ages which “represents the makeup of the country”.As well as representing her constituents, Whittome also wants to be on the same level as them, and feels an MP’s annual salary (currently £93,904) doesn’t represent that. “MPs representing workers’ interests shouldn’t be on salaries that massively separate us from the people we represent.”She’s keen to note that she’s not saying “MPs, don’t work hard, or that we don’t deserve our salaries,” but acknowledges that everyone works hard “firefighters, teaching assistants, HCAs (health care assistants), they all work hard,” she adds. To reflect this, when she first became an MP, Whittome redistributed a large chunk of her salary within her local area “as we’ve got loads of really amazing community projects” and donated a large portion to local charities, organisations and strike funds, taking home £35,000 after tax. She still does the same, but after five years has just increased her take home figure to £41,000.Despite the UK having 650 MPs, donating such a chunk of their salary is a rarity. In the Eighties, MP for Coventry South East, Dave Nellis also donated 54 per cent of his salary for the same reasons. Ellie Chowns, recently elected as North Herefordshire’s Green MP is also donating a large portion of hers too, saying it’s too much. While former Reform MP Rupert Lowe (who had the party whip removed in March and now is an independent for Great Yarmouth) donates his entire salary, as he’s estimated to be worth around £30m, harking back to previous centuries when MPs weren’t paid as they were mostly aristocrats and didn’t need a salary.But Whittome is full of positivity for the future. She’s keen to make progress, which she says is incorrectly “always thought of as being linear,” and wishes that “we weren’t just fighting to roll back the rollbacks”.”I want to see the government finally delivering a trans inclusive conversion therapy ban, to improve access to fertility treatment for lesbian couples, who in most parts of the country are having to self fund at least six cycles before they’re eligible for IVF treatment on the NHS. I want us to be tackling the housing crisis, low pay and workers rights, because members of our community are disproportionately affected by poverty and homelessness. These are things that would improve everyone’s lives.”A few years ago, she says, “we would have been able to talk about these issues, but because the focus is on firefighting, we’ve gone backwards. Now, we’re not in the position of even getting the basics right”. More

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    Macron tells UK it was stronger when it was part of European Union in Brexit swipe

    French president Emmanuel Macron took a swipe at Brexit during his state banquet address at London’s Guildhall on Wednesday (9 July).Macron said: “I’m very respectful of the voice of the people and the choice your country made nine years ago. But I have to say, the European Union was stronger with you, and you were stronger with the European Union.”The French president and Sir Keir Starmer will round off the three-day state visit with a press conference in London on Thursday (10 July) at which they are expected to announce new plans to tackle small boat crossings. More

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    Britons should be forced to vote, says influential charity as turnouts drop

    Every eligible voter in Britain should be forced to cast a ballot, the Constitution Society has said, warning that plummeting turnouts are fuelling the rise of right-wing populists. The educational charity said “disastrously low” turnout as seen at the last general election (59.7 per cent) is undermining democracy and leaving the young and working class unrepresented. And it said Australian-style compulsory voting would redress the imbalance, forcing MPs and the government to pay attention to the interests of young people and renters. Voters will need to show an accepted form of photo ID at polling stations before voting in Thursday’s elections More

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    Former Tory chairman defects to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK in blow to Kemi Badenoch

    Nigel Farage has landed a major scalp as he seeks to revive the momentum in his flagging Reform UK party with the defection of a former Tory chair.Sir Jake Berry, who chaired the party during Liz Truss’s 49-day premiership and had been a staunch ally of Boris Johnson, has announced in an interview with The Sun that he has joined Reform.The move is a major blow to Tory leader Kemi Badenoch who had hoped she was turning the corner after a difficult start in the role.Sir Jake Berry, a former Conservative party chairman, who announced he has joined Reform UK More

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    Starmer’s hopes of ‘one in, one out’ migrant deal hanging in the balance as talks with Macron continue

    Sir Keir Starmer’s hopes to secure his much vaunted “one in, one out” migrant deal with France were hanging in the balance on Wednesday night.Anglo-French talks on the scheme, which would return some illegal migrants back across the Channel, continued just hours before the start of a bilateral summit to be held on Thursday.The British prime minister had hoped he would be able to announce the migration deal before the French president’s three-day state visit ended at the end of Thursday, with some speculating it would be unveiled at the summit.However, discussions were reported to be deadlocked the night before, with the question of how much the UK will pay towards policing small boat crossings a particular sticking point. Beyond money, further obstacles reportedly cited by aides on both sides included possible legal challenges in France as well as potential opposition from other European countries.In response to reports that a deal had already been agreed and was set to be announced on Thursday, a government source told The Independent: “It’s speculation and talks are ongoing.”Emmanuel Macron and Keir Starmer at No 10 on Wednesday More