DOCTORS are considering industrial action for the first time in decades in protest at public sector pension reforms.

Members of the British Medical Association (BMA) in Scotland face being balloted on industrial action in January if doctors respond angrily to a survey on plans to increase their pension contributions and reduce their final payments.

Dr Brian Keighley, chairman of BMA Scotland, said it is unlikely doctors will go on strike, but warned that patients could experience widespread disruption in the form of an emergencies-only service.

Scotland Patients Association responded by claiming members of the public may find it hard to sympathise with doctors at a time when people across the country are on pay freezes or losing their jobs.

The dispute comes several years after GPs agreed a deal allowing them to opt out of out-of-hours care while still earning more money.

But Dr Keighley said the strength of feeling among doctors should "set alarm bells ringing in Westminster and Holyrood".

He said: "Doctors are not by nature likely to embrace industrial action, especially as any action would have a direct impact on patients, but it's a measure of just how angry they are that doctors are even contemplating taking that type of action.

"We're not doing a ballot at the moment, we've decided to do something internal in an open survey of our members to find out how angry they are. And if we get an indication that they are as angry as we think they are, then on January 18 we might decide to proceed to a ballot on industrial action."

He added: "There are a range of actions we could take. However, I would have thought most doctors might decide they'll offer not much more than an emergency service on a couple of days."

Under the pension reforms, doctors and those in the health service who are on the highest wages will see contributions rise from 8.5% to 11.5%, and then finally to 14.5% by 2014.

They will also be forced to work for longer as the retirement age rises to 68, while the amount they receive in retirement will be cut. Dr Keighley claimed the increase in contributions was like a tax on high earners and accused the Government of a "cavalier" attitude.

He added that junior doctors will be among the hardest hit under the proposed changes and could be forced to pay up to an additional £200,000 over the course of their career, only to get less at the end of it.

Dr Keighley said: "They'll have to work until they're 66 or 68 years old in extremely complicated, physically and mentally demanding positions. Is that what people really want from their doctors?"

Dr Keighley added that other issues, including a pay freeze for two years and a 1% rise after that, would contribute to any industrial action.

In 2004, doctors agreed a deal that allowed them to choose whether to offer out-of-hours care and still earn more money.

Prior to the agreement, doctors in Scotland were around £5000 worse off than in the rest of the UK because their list sizes were smaller, but they are now paid according to their catchment area and the services they provide.

Scotland Patients Association's executive director, Dr Jean Turner, said members of the public may have concerns about industrial action taken by doctors.

"I think the majority of patients will not take kindly to it, no matter how reasonable the complaint may be," she said.

"Most patients feel that doctors and nurses get good salaries and good pensions and they might consider even a modified form of striking to be unjustified.

"People across the country are on pay freezes or losing their jobs and I think the general feeling is we just have to get on with it. I definitely don't think that doctors will get the sympathy vote."

John O'Connell, of the TaxPayers' Alliance, said: "It's not right for unions to threaten strike action over necessary pension reforms.

"It's time that the unions took a more realistic approach and thought of hard-pressed tax-payers, and patients that may not get suit ably treated, before making threats like this."