Junior doctors are set to strike across south Buckinghamshire tomorrow, with picket line protests planned to take place outside Stoke Mandeville Hospital.

As the national debate over working hours and weekend pay continues, junior doctors look set to walk out tomorrow despite Prime Minister David Cameron urging them to call off the planned strike.

The strike will start at 8am across England and only emergency care will be provided by junior doctors.

British Medical Association member for Buckinghamshire Healthcare Trust, Dr Rebecca Davies, called the strike a “last resort” and said the decision was not taken lightly.

She said: “We feel completely backed into a corner by the government.

“I would also like to reassure everyone that all A&E departments will be open and fully staffed by junior doctors tomorrow, as on any other day.

“I have every confidence in our consultants to maintain a safe service for patients tomorrow.”

However, there have been warnings from Downing Street that there could be serious consequences for patients, with Mr Cameron saying the strike could cause "real difficulties for patients and potentially worse".

Talks between the doctors' union - the BMA - and NHS bosses are continuing.

Issues being disputed by the BMA and NHS include weekend pay and the need for appropriate safeguards in place to stop doctors over-working.

Dr Davies added: “The reason we feel the need to strike is to protect our patients. This contract is very bad for our patients as it removes the current safeguards that prevent junior doctors from being worked excessive and unsafe hours.

“Exhausted doctors make more mistakes and this is not good for patient care or safety. The current proposals do not represent a robust safeguard to prevent the return to unsafe working hours that our current contract helped to end.

“It is at our very core to put patient safety first but the government is refusing to listen to thousands of junior doctors who are telling them that this change is unsafe.”

She added: “Junior doctors already work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

“Any extension of our hours would either require more doctors, for which there is no plan in place, fewer doctors in the week which would dilute and worsen weekday services, or a significant increase in our hours which would be unfair and unsafe."