My payslip as a doctor in Feb 2021 during COVID

[Juniordoc]

See attached image. Yes this is for full-time work with weekends and nights in the currently stretched working conditions that the NHS provides.

This does not include the expenses and sacrifices of a six year medical degree. On top of that, we have to pay out of pocket for our own GMC membership, medical defence union, postgrad exams and revision courses, conferences and courses.

Please get behind us and support the strikes. We are burnout, exhausted and struggling to live

Personally, I prefer a part-insurance health care system if it means better service. You could throw millions at the NHS but it's a money sucking pit that is past as sort of reform, largely due to the shear volume of people wanting everything from it for free whilst the staff want the highest possible pay. It's can't cope, nor can it deliver those demands from both ends! It's going to collapse and soon...

The British love to suffer and I don't know why?

Junior doctors aside, we are all being chronically underpaid in this country. But any timer for fish and strikes and demand more. British people come out and say we should have more.

We have a housing crisis and a healthcare crisis last week. An elderly woman died because she couldn't afford her heating. People are 'surviving' (barely) but not thriving.

it's madness meanwhile a bunch of elites in government sit and laugh at us!

we should all want more

Advance apologies if I'm bringing something up that has already been raised - haven't read all of the thread responses -

BUT am intrigued why you're posting a payslip that's 2 years old...............?

How about your current one?

Trainees always earn less .........

Which you would still be doing with a 34% pay rise. What’s your point?

I support the strike fully having said that. For a reasonable increase anyway.

What I do not support and has frankly disgusted me this week is the picket line outside great Ormond street. That is wholly inappropriate.

https://medicalschoolexpert.co.uk/how-much-do-doctors-earn/

Average Dr pay is £76k, when you include everyone.

In your first year you get £31k on average, but this increases. This is like any job where you gain more experience and skills!

In my profession you start on less than £20k fully qualified but will work your way up to earning many times that. Just having a qualification doesn't make you useful, it's the experience alongside that does.

Having said that, Drs should be paid enough to retain their services, and if we are losing them abroad quicker than can be replaced then pay rates should go up.

I am in the same position as you although mine is a few years further down the line. It makes me really sad too. I am still so proud of my DD and I know that she is doing it for the best reasons and it is certainly not to get rich! But I look at my immensely clever child, both academically and emotionally, who could have chosen pretty much any path she wanted and think why this one? She is a much better person than I am as I couldn't even give some of the ingrates on here the time of day.

I saw this on Twitter. Your post got a lot of support. It's absolutely criminal. My sister is a newly qualified midwife and she can't afford to eat. What's the point? Where's the incentive? Our government is an absolute disgrace.

Not all Dr's earn this little. I have a parent who works in a hospital and they use a locum worker who gets paid 40,000 for the MONTH.
I also know that my local Dr's are all locums and are bringing in 1000.00 per day, working 4 days and also have their own private surgery on top of this.

Although I think Dr's should be paid more than this payslip, I do wish Dr's would also realise that the majority of people earning this and less per month are also having to survive too on a low amount and many of us are parents and that along is a 24 hour job.

The junior doctors I know are raking it in doing locum work on the side. I suspect the op hasn't shown their current pay slip because they're now capable of doing the same.

less per month are also having to survive too on a low amount and many of us are parents and that along is a 24 hour job.

It isn't a race to the bottom though - this is about pay restoration for a highly skilled job which requires decades of training

Why is being a parent relevant? Many doctors are also parents.

Just a few questions, where is the money coming from to pay for this raise; will you object to tax rises to pay for your wage rise? Will you promise to do no private work later in your careers to avoid their huge costs to the NHS; would you join the army and refuse to fight?

The pay & conditions are poor, op could have done an apprenticeship as a plumber & be earning a minimum of £40 an hour with no student loan to repay, no exam or registration fees. I fully support the Junior doctors with their dispute.

In the same year that OP was earning 13.50ph as a fy1, my 17 year old son was stocking shelves at Asda on night shifts for £12ph.
How can that be right? £1.50 per hour more to do what a doctor does? And I don't think my son was overpaid BTW! And I'm a midwife, so know exactly how hard the fy1s are working. First port of call for everything. Need a pain relief? Call the f1. Need a cannula? F1. Need a discharge prescription? F1. Someone tachy? Temp? Dropped their BP post op? F1. I could go on and on really. If they make mistakes, someone's life can be in the balance.

Doctors are worth far more! The hours, the responsibilities, the dedication etc etc

*I'm front line NHS. 5 years ago my team was 100% western trained (UK, Australian Spanish, Portuguese, Polish).

Now my team is 85% third/developing world trained. Everyone else has left, all the EU staff, many deeply upset that they hadn't realised howvhated they were. Of the other 15% western trained; 10% are working their notice.

I'm off in 3 months. Because I can afford to, but I want to leave, not get sacked due my association with often lovely, but professionally incompetent and embarrassingly difficult to understand- overseas trained staff. It has escalated, as one after another western-trained person leaves. You feel ever more exposed.

If you don't believe me, google the names on the HCPC hearings.

I'm not racist. I'm training-ist.

I recognise it's not all Brexit. It's the removal of the (now reinstalled) HC degree bursary (Tory); the hate-mongering by the Tory supported and promoting tabloids against the NHS (followed by the deifying during Covid...; not the denigrating, again) - and the Brexit-voting of the Tory-supporting tabloid readership.*

UK-trained doctors will leave in their droves at current pay rates.

We are no longer attracting western-trained health professionals. Soon we will no longer be attracting doctors trained in the developing world.

Then they need to act like they have some understanding of their financial situation over the course of their careers because we can't pander to sentiment in a cost of living crisis and they're being disingenuous glossing over the much higher average salary and the very real benefit of a first class pension. I agree with you insofar as the doctors behind this strike are perfectly aware that their financial situation is much better and more secure than the impression given by this payslip. The financial advisors I know (with doctors as clients) are open mouthed at the BS being fed to the public about doctors' financial situation in real terms. You don't look at the first year and make a decision based on that. These doctors will not be coming to financial advisors in a decade with this kind of money to discuss their financial futures. Their situation is entirely different to how it's being presented to the public.

You are in training, you are not in charge and you are only at the beginning of your professional career. You will earn plenty of money in a few years if you work for promotion and what I’m guessing motivated your career choice - your high status. You care only about yourself and to go on strike like this shows your selfish disregard for the public and for the NHS.

@Juniordoc - have you thought about going abroad?! Australia, New Zealand, Canada etc. I'm sure plenty of your colleagues have up sticks and left. I don't think anyone would blame you for doing so.

Fully support you in striking - you are worth more to the UK and the NHS than you are being paid.

Trainee? You have no idea, have you.

I have read a host of wonderful messages on here. Thank you all so much for your support. Did not realise the public supported us so much but some of the comments are really thoughtful and heartwarming and my colleagues and I really appreciate them.

I have read comments such as why not going abroad. This is precisely what a lot of doctors are doing causing a brain drain. But it is hard to do if you have family and dependents here.

At the end of the day, we are here to serve you and our public. We went into this job to do what we love. But with the chronic underfunding and working conditions, we are not able to work to the our capacity. Not all doctors can leave otherwise who will serve our public?

I hope one day that enough pressure can be put on our government who have the ability to change things for us. Addressing pay is one way. If doctors felt at least sufficiently numerated so they could also live normal lives, enjoy time with family etc, that would be a big step. By addressing pay, you will address the brain drain, there will be less rota gaps and staff shortages, better care can be provided to our patients and public, doctors and healthcare staff will feel valued etc etc.....

I have not given hope yet. The strikes are one way of putting pressure on our government for a better NHS for us all, doctors, nurses and patients alike.

Once again, thank you our public for your support. It really and truly means a lot to us all, you honestly have no idea

Agree, 35% is ridiculous