Members of Unite Union within our Pathology department have called a third strike, which will take place from 00.01 Monday 27 April to 23.59 on Friday 1 May.

They are striking due to the changes we need to make to the way the service is run. We are one of very few trusts that don’t have a 24/7 service and rely on a voluntary on call system for out of hours work.

As with previous industrial action, it will severely impact the capacity for testing in our laboratories to process samples and we apologise to patients for any delays caused.

To help maintain patient safety, and to minimise disruption, we are prioritising clinically urgent cases, such as tests for cancer patients and emergency patients needing blood transfusions. If you have not been contacted, please attend your appointment as planned.

During the five days there will be less availability for routine blood tests which take place in the community and are sent to our laboratories for testing. We’re working closely with GPs to ensure patients get their results back as quickly as possible and will have plans in place for any tests they feel are urgent.

We are also calling on Unite to agree safe staffing cover, as usually happens during a strike in the NHS to reduce the risk faced by patients.

We appreciate moving to a new shift system will impact colleagues. We have offered Unite an enhanced level of pay protection for colleagues affected by a loss of earnings, that is above Trust Policy and is comparable to what other NHS Trusts offered when going through such consultations with Unite. Unite have not accepted this enhanced offer.

We have also made clear we will not bring the system in until we have held a proper consultation process with staff and have offered a secondment for a Unite representative to work on this with us.

We’re keen to continue negotiating and hope a resolution is found, so we can work with our staff to successfully implement a 24/7 service and keep our patients safer.