Listen to the nonsense that issues from former Health Sec Steve Barclay’s lips when he’s challenged on why his government won’t negotiate with striking junior doctors, while they’re on strike.

I don’t actually agree with Peter Stefanovic about Susanna Reid; she could have been much more incisive.

The issue is that the government says it will not negotiate on pay with junior doctors while they are involved in strike action. It will only talk if they call their strikes off.

But if they call their strikes off, then the government won’t have any reason to negotiate on pay with junior doctors. So it won’t; it will merely continue to impose punitive real-terms pay cuts.

“There was a catch, and it was Catch-22.”

As a member of the public, you need to be aware of this Tory government tactic, and of how unfair it is.

Doctors’ pay has been eroded by more than one-third – by Tory governments – in the years since they took over responsibility for the health service in 2010. By comparison, Tory MPs’ salaries have remained at the same level, in real terms, as they were in 2010.

The only way the Tories would have a tenable argument against increasing junior doctors’ pay by the 35 per cent needed to return it to parity with 2010 would be if their own pay had also tumbled. It hasn’t, so they don’t.

Do you remember the Tory mantra from the general election of 2010? It was “We’re all in it together.”

Could there be a stronger argument than this that they were lying?

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