Industrial action planning: 24 – 28 February

February 26, 2024

As industrial action continues across the NHS our planning to accommodate it whilst providing safe care for our patients is becoming increasingly well practised. That is not to say we are complacent because clearly, we are not. We fully recognise the toll that continued action is having across our entire workforce, and we keep that in mind whilst planning our response to continued industrial action.

Since the announcement of a full walk out of doctors in training from 7am on Saturday 24 February to 11.59pm on Wednesday 28 February, we have been working towards ensuring the safety of patients and wellbeing of staff whilst providing emergency care over the period. We have already stood up tactical meetings to oversee risks and prepare for the action and these will continue at 8.30am, 4.30pm and 10pm during the week, and 8am, 4pm and 8pm at the weekend over the strike period. If you have any questions or concerns regarding our response to industrial action, please escalate through your line manager to feed into the tactical group.

IT support: Through the period of industrial action Saturday 24 February – Wednesday 28 February, IT will be offering floorwalker support across both Sandwell and City. On the weekend floorwalkers will be available until 4pm and during the weekdays until midnight (12am). The IT helpdesk (ext. 4050) will also be extending their opening hours and will be available until midnight during the industrial action

Meeting arrangements

Group management leads will judge whether pre-planned meetings go ahead, and where they do, it is expected that their service has enough operational cover to maintain business as usual. Corporate meetings in the diary during this period which will go ahead with condensed agendas are:

1. PMG, Monday 26 February
2. Trust Management Committee, Tuesday 27 February
3. Quality Committee, Team Talk and People Committee, Wednesday 28 February

Staff welfare and on call arrangements

To support staff on site, senior on-call managers will physically attend more site safety (previously called capacity) meetings before commencing walkabouts to check in with those on the front line. During the weekend, the senior on-call manager and additional senior manager will attend the 1pm site safety meeting and remain on site until 4.30pm, potentially later if required until they judge the sites to be safe. On weekdays the senior on-call manager and additional senior manager will be on site from 4pm and remain on site until 7.30pm – or later if required.

The executive directors on-call over the weekend (Richard Beeken on Saturday and Rachel Barlow on Sunday) will also attend site for a couple of hours to support colleagues.

The frequently asked questions for junior doctors as well as around pay have recently been updated – please see below:

• Junior Doctor Industrial Action FAQs 19 February 2024
• Pay Medical staff FAQs Industrial Action February 2024

Costa enhanced opening times Sandwell and City: