Junior doctors have lost a judicial review challenging the legality of a controversial new contract, which is now set to be introduced next week.

In a judgment published on Wednesday, Mr Justice Green rejected arguments presented at the high court by five junior doctors that the health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, had exceeded his powers.

The decision means that the long-running impasse over the contract remains. The junior doctors, who formed the group Justice for Health, claimed Green’s finding that Hunt was not imposing the contract, but merely encouraging employers to introduce it, was a victory for them.

Their interpretation was that it meant medics were free not to sign it and opened the door to negotiations with the NHS nationally or at trust level, although such a prospect appears unlikely.

Amar Mashru, one of the five who brought the case, said: “What is now allowed is the employers and employees at a national level to negotiate and agree terms which are genuinely in the interests of patients and staff. They are essentially free from the shackles of this irrational and hasty timeline set by the secretary of state.”

He said it was possible that trusts would retain the existing contract until new terms and conditions satisfactory to both sides were agreed.

Chris Hopson, chief executive of NHS Providers, which represents trusts, said: “Junior doctors have raised a number of legitimate concerns that still need to be addressed and NHS trusts will be working hard with their junior doctors to do so. In particular, those issues that are within the remit of the contract – for example the introduction of a new guardian role to each trust – need to be implemented consistently.”

He added: “As for suggestions that individual trusts have a choice as to whether to introduce the new contract or not, NHS trusts tell us that they believe a single national contract offers a consistent approach that is in the best interests of patients and the wider NHS workforce. This is also the view of the NHS arm’s-length bodies.”

The doctors had argued that the health secretary had no power, whether solely or with others, to impose terms on which junior doctors were employed, only to make recommendations; that Hunt had acted in breach of the requirements of transparency, certainty and clarity; and that he had acted irrationally.

But Green rejected all three grounds. And he further said that he did not accept the claimants’ argument that the evidence base upon which the minister acted was inadequate and rejected the suggestion that Hunt had misled parliament.

Dr Ellen McCourt, BMA junior doctor committee chair, said the concerns of junior doctors still needed to be addressed before the contract comes into effect.

“Today’s result should not be viewed as a win for the government,” she said. “This ruling will do nothing to address the fact that morale among junior doctors is at an all-time low. Nor will it quell junior doctors’ concerns about the imminent introduction of a flawed contract they have rejected, or the deep sense of anger and mistrust that has built up towards the government over the last year.”

The Department of Health urged the BMA to drop the threat of industrial action in light of the ruling. “We welcome this clear decision by the judge that the secretary of state acted entirely lawfully,” a spokeswoman said. “We must now move on from this dispute to the crucial job of making sure patients get the same high standards of urgent and emergency care every day of the week, which involves more than the junior doctors’ contract.”

Green heard that lawyers representing Hunt had run up bills of around £150,000 and said that Justice for Health should pay £55,000 of that figure.

In a two-day hearing last week at the royal courts of justice in London, Jenni Richards QC, for Justice for Health, asked the court to quash Hunt’s decision to bring in the new contract, which she maintained he had no power to do, especially since the Health and Social Care Act 2012 reduced the scope of the health secretary’s powers.

The health secretary, Jeremy Hunt, is now set to introduce the new contract next week. Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters

But Clive Sheldon QC, appearing for Hunt, rejected the doctors’ arguments and said their case was without substance. The health secretary had not decided to “compel” NHS trusts to use the new contract, he had merely approved it, Sheldon said.

“The secretary of state has not gone outside the scope of his powers,” he told the court. “The secretary of state has been clear about what his powers are.”



The five doctors’ high court legal challenge was crowdfunded by £300,000 from about 10,000 donors, most of them fellow junior doctors.

Many, frustrated that eight days of strike action between January and May had failed to force Hunt to lift his threat of imposition, hoped that the lawsuit might delay or even scupper Hunt’s plans.

The BMA is facing a backlash from its members after first announcing, and then last Saturday calling off, plans for a series of four all-out strikes by junior doctors as a way of increasing the pressure on Hunt.

As things stand, NHS trusts across England will start phasing in the contract from next week in a process that will take about 18 months to put all 54,000 doctors below the level of consultant on to the altered terms and conditions.



This week Sir David Nicholson, who was the chief executive of the NHS in England until 2014, criticised ministers’ handling of the year long dispute.

“Clearly the government overall got it wrong,” Nicholson said. He said given that today’s generation of junior doctors wanted to work more flexibly and have more control over their lives, “it seemed to me that the way the conversation was going … I was really worried that it was less to do with the issues around that particular problem and more to do with a general idea that somehow we needed to put the junior doctors in their place.”