This strike is a bill for neglect, delivered with interest. Resident doctors are not walking out because they fancy a row, they are walking out because pay has been eroded and training posts are bottlenecked while ministers talk in slogans. The BMA put the government's latest proposal to members and 83% rejected it, with a turnout that shows this is not a fringe tantrum. The offer leaned on jobs and training places and did not include a pay rise for the current financial year, then Health Secretary Wes Streeting acted as if surprise were a policy. How many times must the NHS be propped up by sheer exhaustion before we admit the model is broken? You can condemn a five-day strike from 17 to 22 December, but you should also condemn the slow strike already happening as doctors leave, cut hours, or burn out. Pay them fairly, staff the system honestly, and the picket lines disappear without a single lecture.