THE Royal College of Nursing (RCN) vowed today to “keep using the stronger voice of nurses” to demand a better NHS after the union’s latest strike ballot in England failed to reach an arbitrary Tory threshold for turnout.

While the vast majority of participants backing continuing industrial action for another six months, turnout was just over 43 per cent, below the 50 per cent required by the government’s widely condemned Trade Union Act 2016.

After Unison and organisations representing physiotherapists and midwives accepted an improved but still below-inflation deal, Unite is the only remaining union in England to have an active strike mandate.