About half the country's junior doctors have walked off the job for 25 hours in a nation-wide protest for pay equity.
Nearly 2500 junior doctors took to the streets from 7am today outside eight of the country's main hospitals.
The doctors taking industrial action are members of the Resident Doctors' Association, which failed to reach a new pay agreement with Te Whatu Ora.
Negotiations between the association and Te Whatu Ora reached an "impasse" last month over what the union described as "unacceptable elements".
The union said the current offer would see hundred of doctors receive a pay cut.
Speaking on Breakfast, Resident Doctors' Association secretary Deborah Powell said today's strike was the result of Te Whatu Ora's financial parameters remaining the same since bargaining began.
She said about 300 members working as registrars in "shortage speciality departments" such as radiation/oncology, public health, psychiatry and those entering GP training would miss out on pay rises.
"A further 300 are trainees who would be looking at general practice."
Most were due for a pay rise of about 20% in their latest contract, but said they were striking to support a smaller group in line for a pay cut.
"The majority of our members, 97% said 'that's not fair'. And even though the majority would get a payrise, they've rejected that because it's not fair on their colleagues," Powell said.
"Secondly, the issue of parity. There is another doctor's union and under this offer they would get paid up to 5% more than us."
Powell said the other main doctor's union, which are still working, does make bargaining more difficult.
"The fundamentals are still the same, it's not fair that we're doing the same job and getting paid less."
'A pretty rubbish deal'
One junior doctor on the picket line in Christchurch called Te Whatu Ora's offer a "pretty rubbish deal".
"They've offered us a pay deal which is a pay cut for a substantial amount of our members."
She said the system needs to retain staff so that they become consultants so that people can continue to get the care they need.
She said it was "not good enough" that doctors were being left behind, and cited her colleagues who had moved to Australia for better pay.
"We have 500 vacancies and no way to fill them, and offering us a pay cut isn't gonna fix that."
Another junior doctor who works in the emergency department agreed, saying doctors already feel immense pressure under the current healthcare system.
"This is not the time to be suggesting to the doctors [that] we need the most, that they're potentially facing a pay cut or pay freeze, and if we want to continue to retain and train doctors in New Zealand, we need to give them something to train for."
She said doctors are naturally at risk of burnout because they want to go "above and beyond" for patients.
"One of the things that we're fighting to remove at the moment is called double-long days. Tired doctors make mistakes, that's just not safe for patients."
'Quite insulting'
Junior doctor Gina Seyb in Dunedin said she planned to keep striking for the rights of her fellow junior doctors to recognise the rights of people in public health.
"I'd like to know what the Government was thinking when they proposed this to us from Te Whatu Ora.
"It's quite insulting I think to a lot of us out there who work as hard as anyone in the hospital and they've still decided that we're not worth it."
She said the whole hospital system was suffering as a result of under funding, saying it was all "a bit of a slap in the face".
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