THE Swindon-born shadow health secretary has slammed Jeremy Hunt for forcing through a contract to junior doctors.

In the House of Commons today, Walcot-born MP Heidi Alexander held health secretary of state Hunt to account after he failed to reach an agreement with the British Medical Association.

The former Churchfields School pupil called Hunt out for his “massive oversimplification” of the junior doctors’ contract dispute, after he announced his plans to impose a new contract.

“This could amount to the biggest gamble with patient safety this House has ever seen,” she said.

“The health secretary has been keen to present a new contract as the key that unlocks the delivery of seven day services. This is a massive oversimplification and he knows it.”

During her speech Lewisham East MP Alexander said Hunt had made a grave error in imposing a contract that could harm junior doctors’ pay and employment rights.

“This whole dispute could have been handled so differently. Everyone, including the BMA agrees with the need to reform the current contract. But hardly anyone thinks the need to do that is so urgent that it justifies imposition, and all the chaos that will bring,” she said.

“What legal advice has the secretary of state taken about how an imposed contract would work in practice? What employment rights do junior doctors have in this context? And what happens if they simply refuse to sign."

The contract announcement comes one day after junior doctors took strike action for the second time.

The new contract will be introduced by NHS trusts from August 1. For the first time Saturdays from 7am to 5pm will become part of a normal working week for 45,000 junior doctors- and receive only basic pay. These hours are known as “plain time”.

Plain time hours on a week day will also be extended from 7pm to 9pm, which means junior doctors will lose generous overtime payment. Basic pay will rise by 13.5 percent, more than the originally offered 11 percent.

Leading town medic Dr Peter Swinyard, from Toothill’s Phoenix Surgery, said he believed the decision would force young doctors out of the country.

“I’m not surprised but I am disappointed, so deeply disappointed in what has happened. I think it is ignorance on Jeremy Hunt’s part,” he said.

“There will be a significant exodus where junior doctors will simply leave the country for Ireland, Scotland, Wales or elsewhere.

“The NHS should be on a needs basis, not a want. It can’t operate like that.

“The BMA cannot simply lie down, roll over and take this and I don’t think they will. I think the BMA will be burning the midnight oil to figure out their next course of action. It’s a very scary and uncertain time.”