Secret plans by militant junior doctors to con patients and cripple the NHS with a mass walkout can today be revealed.

The cynical attempt to dupe the public and plunge the NHS into its biggest ever crisis is laid bare in a special Facebook chatroom set up by junior doctors’ leaders.

In it the British Medical Association members disclose their secret strategy for industrial action, which includes:

Posts on a special Facebook chatroom set up by junior doctors' leaders disclose their secret strategy for industrial action

l Urging doctors to recoup a day’s wages lost through strike action with ‘two crem forms’ – death certificates that doctors get paid £120 for signing: a female doctor calls it ‘ash cash’.

l Admitting they must stick to questionable claims that their pay will be cut by up to 40 per cent because otherwise ‘we’re toast’.

l Pledging ‘emergency cover only’ initially to ‘soften the blow from the media against a full walk-out, which would come very quickly after’.

l Describing the fight to win support for a total strike as a ‘public relations nightmare’.

l Admitting ‘many’ moderate doctors oppose industrial action but have kept quiet.

The comments are on a Facebook chatroom, seen by The Mail on Sunday, which can usually be accessed only by doctors.

Medics are voting on strike action over plans by Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt to boost weekend services in hospitals. In return for losing overtime for working on Saturdays and weekday evenings, they have been offered a pay rise to their basic salary of 11 per cent.

On the ‘strike chatroom’, Dr Adam Collins, a member of the BMA’s junior doctors’ executive, says strikers are planning a partial walk-out initially to head off claims that they are endangering patients’ lives.

He suggests restricting clinical cover in hospitals to a ‘Christmas Day service’ – shorthand for essential health functions only – to ‘soften the blow from the media against a full walk-out, which would come very quickly after’.

He says: ‘It is a tiny step… which will win us some positive spin… we will then be able to threaten full walk-out… and we will do that very quickly.’

Dr Collins, 24, says ‘striking is a PR nightmare and we need to mitigate it’, so ‘we need to start out with Xmas day cover to win some of the media battle but the BMA and JDC (Junior Doctors Committee) are fully committed to a full walk-out’.

Dr Collins, an Edinburgh University-educated junior doctor who works at NHS Lothian, says: ‘Regardless of what we think the effect of emergency only cover will be, PR wise it’s a necessary first step... we really think that… to ensure that those junior doctors who are not sold on a full strike – and they are many, but they are quiet on social media – we need to talk this stepwise approach. Our escalation... will be swift’.

Another junior doctor, Mark Bagnall, tells the group not to worry about the loss of salary through industrial action because it can be easily recouped with ‘two crem forms’.

In response, a Dr Lizy Townshend praises his ‘ash cash’ suggestion.

Dr Roshana Mehdian, 30, who helped organise a junior doctors’ march in London last month, appears to admit claims that the new contract will lead to pay cuts of up to 40 per cent are exaggerated. After another doctor says ‘please please stop quoting the 30-40% figure... we have no idea’, Dr Mehdian brushes away his objections, saying: ‘Do not change tac [sic] in the media’ otherwise ‘we will be opened up to an immense beating’.

Government has left us with no alternative

She concedes: ‘Intellectually, I’m with you [but] if we waver, I promise you, we’re toast’.

Another doctor, Simon Lee Robinson, backed Dr Mehdian, saying ‘that’s how PR works’.

Last night, Dr Mehdian stood by her comments on Facebook, saying GPs and A&E doctors could soon lose supplements worth up to 40 per cent of pay. ‘Under the contract, in 2019 junior doctors will be receiving up to 30 per cent less than today because the pay of those below a certain level and those coming through the ranks is not going to be protected,’ she added.

The Mail on Sunday asked the BMA if Dr Collins wanted to comment but he declined. A BMA spokesman said: ‘The decision to ballot for industrial action is not one we have taken lightly and we have been clear that we are proposing the emergency care model of action in the first instance, with the possibility of adopting other forms of action after this.

‘It is the Government’s refusal to work with the BMA through genuine negotiations, and its continued threat to impose an unsafe and unfair contract, that has left us with no alternative.’

The result of the ballot is due on November 20.

What do doctors want? No work on Saturdays. Why? I'm a weekend wedding photographer

The leader of the junior doctors has every reason to want to avoid Saturday work – he runs a wedding photography business on the side.

Johann Malawana, 35, who chairs the BMA’s junior doctors committee, offers ‘Gold’, ‘Platinum’ and ‘Diamond’ packages – and a special discount where one of the couple works for the NHS. The obstetrician says if couples opt for Johann Malawana Photography’s £4,590 Diamond package he is happy ‘to stay on and get some action shots of the crazy dancing for you to remember the bits you may not otherwise’.

Smile please: Johann Malawana, 35, who chairs the BMA's junior doctors committee, takes a picture at a wedding

Dr Malawana, who owns a £540,000 home in Hertfordshire and a £400,000 flat in North London, boasts that he personally shoots each wedding

It also includes an ‘engagement location shoot’, a ‘social media selection of images’, a ‘trash the wedding dress’ shoot after the wedding, a first anniversary location shoot and ‘a special offer of 25 per cent off my usual print rate’. Dr Malawana, who owns a £540,000 home in Hertfordshire and a £400,000 flat in North London, boasts that he personally shoots each wedding, ‘designing the specifications around the needs of the bride and groom’, normally meeting with the couple at least once or twice prior to the day – more if they desire.

Under the proposed contract weekday evenings and Saturdays will be reclassified as part of the normal working week.

When Dr Malawana, who is married to a GP, with whom he has a two-year-old son, was appointed as the junior doctors leader last month he complained of ‘17-hour days’ and said: ‘If we carry on like this, it’s just going to get worse and worse. We need to draw a line beyond which we start getting into extremely unsafe territory.’

The BMA said Dr Malawana’s business was ‘a small company’ and only takes on a handful of small jobs each year.

We can heal the NHS if Hunt would just listen, says Dr Anna Warrington

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt says his new contract for doctors will make hospitals safer, but we know it will harm patients more than heal them.

I readily admit the NHS could be improved. And when Mr Hunt highlights patient safety problems at weekends, I agree that should be tackled – even if the evidence isn’t as strong as he claims.

But his plan isn’t for better funding and staffing for the NHS at weekends. Rather, it’s to impose a contract on junior doctors that stretches to breaking point an already understaffed and underfunded service.

Many see this dispute as a fight over pay, and while that is important, it’s certainly not the whole story. Doctors are mainly worried about patient safety and the health of the NHS itself.

This contract will remove effective penalties against unsafe hours, meaning hospitals could work doctors to exhaustion like the bad old days.

The contract is also likely to cause an exodus of doctors because a pay cut will price us out of an expensive profession. Like other doctors, I spend a quarter of my monthly income on training and I’m set to lose up to a third of my salary.

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, pictured during Prime Minister's Questions in the House of Commons, says his new contract for doctors will make hospitals safer

Worse still, the contract will hit hardest the toughest and most understaffed areas – A&E, general practice and psychiatry.

We could help Mr Hunt improve the NHS if only he’d listen. Unfortunately, he focuses on spin instead. He repeatedly tells the public his contract will deliver a seven-day NHS by making it easy for hospitals to force doctors to work weekends. This leaves us baffled. We already work weekends, willingly. And we really do want to make care better.

Mr Hunt lets it be leaked that he is offering junior doctors an 11 per cent rise to basic pay and promising no drop in overall pay for most doctors.

But how can we believe him when the contract will mean a big pay cut for our hardest hours – evenings and weekends – which will far outweigh the pay rise? We can’t ask him about this because he’ll only talk to the press, not us.

So, faced with a Minister who doesn’t listen and won’t talk, last week the doctors’ union the BMA issued a ballot for industrial action.

We have taken a vow to do no harm. The 50,000-strong army of junior doctors has the backing of consultants and they will cover the frontline services to ensure no patient comes to harm if we strike.

The Minister for Spin will no doubt tell the public that doctors are striking for greed and harming patients in doing so.