Thousands of ambulance workers in England and Wales are going on strike today – with NHS leaders warning that they cannot guarantee the safety of patients.
Speaking to Sky News, Health Secretary Steve Barclay said the system would be “under severe pressure” due to the strike, and urged Britons to use “common sense in terms of what activities they do”.
He accused trade unions of choosing a time for the strike when the NHS is already facing winter pressures due to flu, COVID and other illnesses.
The strikes, involving around 25,000 staff, are taking place after last-ditch crisis talks between Mr Barclay and unions failed to address the issue of pay.
Unison’s strike is running from noon until midnight, while the GMB action began at 12am and will also run until midnight this evening. Unite’s strike began at midnight and will conclude at midday.
It is expected that all Category 1 calls (the most life-threatening, such as cardiac arrest) will be responded to during the strike action today, while some ambulance trusts have agreed exemptions with unions for specific incidents within Category 2 (serious conditions, such as stroke or chest pain).
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It means those who suffer trips, falls or other non-life-threatening injuries may not receive treatment.
Mr Barclay said some decisions about what will be covered during strikes by ambulance workers today will be taken on the day.
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Asked why there was not a national contingency plan in place for the industrial action, he told Sky News: “The difficulty with putting contingency measures in place is given the uncertainty as to what exactly is and is not being covered, and the fact that those decisions in some cases will be taken on the day.
“But it’s also the case that even what’s referred to as Category 3 urgent calls are often very serious as well. So we’re doing all we can with NHS colleagues to put in place contingency measures.”
He accused the unions of refusing to guarantee a “national exemption” for life-threatening cases but unions have repeatedly said they have agreed on a local level that Category 1 and 2 calls will be covered and they emphasised that during a meeting on Tuesday.
About 600 members of the army, navy and the RAF have been drafted in from across the country to help during the walkouts, some of whom have never driven the vehicles before.
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‘I cannot express how bad it is’ – paramedic
Ahead of the industrial action, the unions had called on the government to make an offer on pay and suggested an agreement could be reached.
While Onay Kasab, from Unite, warned after the meeting that ambulance strikes would “escalate” unless the government agreed to negotiations.
“Our members are absolutely determined to win not just the pay battle but to win the battle to save the NHS,” he said.
Mr Barclay said: “Further pay increases would mean taking money away from frontline services at a time when we are tackling record waiting lists as a result of the pandemic.”
Writing in The Telegraph, the health secretary added: “We now know that the NHS contingency plans will not cover all 999 calls. Ambulance unions have taken a conscious choice to inflict harm on patients.”
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GMB union boss: ‘Make us an offer on pay’
But Rachel Harrison from the GMB union hit back, telling Sky News: “I actually think that’s a really insulting statement to our key NHS and ambulance workers. They’ve not made a conscious decision to put lives at risk.
“They’ve made a conscious decision to stand up for what they believe is an NHS that is crumbling beneath their feet and as they’re watching thousands of their colleagues leave the service every year because of poor pay and poor working conditions and a feeling of being unable to deliver the safe standards of patient care that they want to.
“That’s why they’re making this conscious decision and it is insulting to say that they’re doing this to put people at risk.”
NHS Confederation chief executive Matthew Taylor said: “We have reached the stage where our leaders feel it’s necessary to say they cannot guarantee patient safety, they cannot avoid risks as these strikes unfold.”
The strike action comes a day after ambulance and hospital trusts across the country declared critical incidents as a result of “sustained” and “unprecedented” pressure on services.
Royal College of Nursing chief Pat Cullen has confirmed that nurses will announce post-Christmas strikes by the end of the week unless the government agrees a deal on pay.
She warned Mr Sunak that the “clock is running” for him to enter negotiations to prevent further action.
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Strikes: ‘Critical incidents’ declared
Yesterday, health minister Will Quince urged people to think again about contact sports and avoid running on icy roads during the ambulance strike.
Footage of the moment 10-year-old Sara Sharif’s alleged killers were detained after police boarded their plane back to the UK has been played in court.
As they are approached by officers, Sara‘sstepmother Beinash Batool is heard saying: “I think you’re looking for us.”
Batool, 30, Sara’s father Urfan Sharif, 42, and uncle Faisal Malik, 29, are accused of carrying out a campaign of abuse against her culminating in her death at her family home in Surreyon 8 August last year.
The defendants, along with five of Sara’s siblings, aged between one and 13, flew to Pakistanthe following day.
Sara’s body was found by police in a bunkbed on 10 August after Sharif called police from Pakistan to say he had beaten her “too much” for being “naughty”.
A murder investigation was launched involving agencies including Interpol and the National Crime Agency to locate the defendants.
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They returned to the UK on a flight from Dubai to Gatwick Airport on 13 September.
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‘I beat her up too much’
The clips of officers’ body-worn video shown to the jury on Friday captured the moment police boarded the plane and detained the defendants at 7.42pm, seven minutes after touchdown.
After Batool addresses the officers, Sharif, who had been sitting next to her, is asked to follow them.
The three were then taken off the plane and arrested.
A post-mortem examination established Sara had sustained extensive and significant injuries over a sustained period prior to her death.
The jury heard on Friday how concerns were raised by Sara’s school about bruising on her body in June 2022 and March 2023.
Several items seized from Sara’s home were also reviewed by the court, including a leather belt which had full DNA samples at both ends for Sara, Sharif, and Malik.
A cricket bat was also found to have Sara’s DNA profile on it, along with the DNA samples of Sharif and Malik.
Neither item had a DNA trace of Batool.
The court also reviewed the defendants’ bank accounts – both joint and separate.
All three defendants have pleaded not guilty to murder and causing or allowing the death of a child.
Six teenagers have been arrested after a 13-year-old girl was found with multiple stab wounds on a roadside near Hull.
Police said she was found around 6.50am on the A63 in Hessle with “life-threatening injuries” including “lacerations to her neck, abdomen, chest and back”.
Four boys and two girls – aged between 14 and 17 – were quickly arrested in a nearby wooded area and are being questioned on suspicion of attempted murder.
Members of the public came to the girl’s aid before emergency services arrived, Humberside Police said.
Detective Superintendent Simon Vickers said they “believe the attackers knew the victim” and the circumstances are still being investigated.
“The girl remains in hospital in critical condition and her family are being supported by officers at this difficult time,” he added.
The boys arrested are aged 14, 15, 16 and 17, and the girls 14 and 15.
Cordons are in place around a wooded area off Ferriby High Road while investigations continue.
Police said they would have an increased presence in the area over the weekend and have asked anyone with information or video to get in touch, or contact Crimestoppers anonymously.
A former soldier has told a jury his escape from Wandsworth prison to avoid being held with sex offenders and terrorists showed his “skillset”.
Daniel Khalife, 23, who was being held accused of passing secrets to Iran said he was “never a real spy” but planned a fake defection to the state following his arrest after watching American television show Homeland.
He said he wanted to be moved to a high-security unit because he was getting unwanted attention from the sex offenders on the vulnerable prisoners wing and feared a move to Belmarsh prison because, as a British soldier, terrorists wanted to kill him.
Khalife said he first wanted to “make a show” of escaping, acting suspiciously and covering himself in soot from a food delivery lorry on 21 August last year, while he was working in the prison kitchen.
He was spotted and reported to security but was “pretty shocked” when nothing happened so decided to take the “full measure,” he told the jury.
Talking about his escape for the first time at his Woolwich Crown Court trial, Khalife told how he fashioned a makeshift sling from kitchen trousers and carabiners used by inmates to keep their possessions safe from rats.
He attached it to the Bidfood lorry on 1 September last year, to see if it would be spotted by officers at Wandsworth or other prisons on the delivery route.
“I put the two carabiners and the makeshift rope underneath the lorry,” he said.
“When I had made the decision to actually leave the prison I was going to do it properly so I tested the security not just in Wandsworth
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“Strangely, over the coming days, I could see it but it wasn’t spotted in Wandsworth or any other prison.”
Then on the morning of 6 September, Khalife said he concealed himself underneath the lorry, resting his back on the sling as the lorry was searched.
“They did normal checks around with torches but they didn’t find me. After that, a governor came to the tunnel and said, ‘Have you searched the vehicle?’
“I was facing upwards. There was action around the lorry.”
He said that when the vehicle stopped he “came out underneath the lorry and stayed in the prone position” until the lorry moved off.
Khalife, who joined the Army aged 16 and took up a post with the Royal Signals, based in Beacons barracks, Staffordshire, said he made no attempt to leave the country and had no intention to “run away” from the charges he was facing.
He was arrested three days later on the footpath of the Grand Union Canal in Northolt, west London, after a nationwide manhunt.
Asked why he had not handed himself in after his escape, Khalife said: “I was finally demonstrating what a foolish idea it was to have someone of my skillset in prison. What use was that to anyone?”
“I accept that I left the prison and didn’t have any permission to do so,” he said. “I accept absolutely that I shouldn’t have done what I did.”
Inspired by Homeland
The court has heard Khalife initiated contact with Iranian intelligence officers after he was told he could not pass developed vetting because his mother was born in Iran.
Khalife told MI5 he wanted to be a “double agent” and he said in court he thought he would be “congratulated” but described his arrest as like a “punch in the face”.
Wearing a blue checked shirt and chinos, he said police were “blinded at the prospect of a successful prosecution” but he did not think being in prison would be in “the public interest”.
“I didn’t do anything that harmed our national security. I wanted to put myself in a position where I could help my country,” he said.
“I believed I could continue my work actually located in the state – the state being Iran.”
Khalife said he took inspiration from watching Homeland, starring Claire Danes and Damian Lewis, in which Americans and terrorists go undercover, on Netflix.
“I had seen one of the characters in the programme had actually falsely defected to a particular country and utilised that position to further the national security interests of that character’s country,” he said.
“The country in question, Iran, thought it was real. She did it to further the interests of her own country.”
Khalife told jurors he is a “patriot”, adding: “I do love my country. All I wanted to do was help. I never wanted to do any harm, I never did do any harm.”
He added: “It is tragic it has come to this and I would do anything to go back to my career.”
Khalife, from Kingston, southwest London, denies a charge of committing an act prejudicial to the safety or interests of the state under the Official Secrets Act between 1 May 2019 and 6 January 2022.
He has also pleaded not guilty to a charge under the Terrorism Act of eliciting information about Armed Forces personnel on 2 August 2021, perpetrating a bomb hoax on or before 2 January 2023 and escaping from prison on 6 September last year.