The Conservative party chairman, Nadhim Zahawi, has been accused of insulting NHS workers with a "ludicrous" suggestion that it is the wrong time to strike over low pay because it would help Vladimir Putin divide the west.
Zahawi told broadcasters that nurses should call off their strikes and abandon their pay demands because it risked playing into the hands of the Russian president, who he said wanted to fuel inflation in the west.
He called on unions representing nurses and other medical workers to enter into talks, though the Royal College of Nurses (RCN) pointed out that it was government ministers who were refusing to open any negotiations over the NHS pay deal. Union sources have indicated they, would be willing to look at a sub-inflation offer but the government is declining to discuss pay at all.
The RCN has planned two possible strike days, on 15 and 20 December, if the government refuses to revisit its 3% offer with inflation running at 11%. Unison, Unite and the GMB are also looking at industrial action, with ambulance workers in some trusts likely to strike before Christmas.
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