Is there sympathy for consultants striking?

[LadyTemperance]

Just as the thread title says, do you feel sympathy for the consultant doctors pay demands. I understand their pay has not gone up for many years meaning they have had a cut in real terms. That being said a quick google tells me they start on 88k and have regular pay rises not based on performance.
They are hardly on the bread line are they?

But they think 88k gets you a mansion and private jet!
That’d be a very idiotic trailing spouse!!

@Lapland123

Good point!

I’m going with the disgruntled teenager theory too. The howls of outrage and the downright lies fit this.

She first said this when told of the salary in ROI

So we are supposed to believe that this poster earns double in Ireland of all places compared to the city of London for instance? I am calling absolute BS on this, because I know many consultants in London and all of their salaries start with a 2 and many significantly upward of that!!

and then when provided with proof (the publicly available salary scales which she really should have googled before making an idiot of herself) she came back spouting nonsense saying that of course Ireland had to pay that as we couldn’t get people otherwise.

When called out on it, she claimed I was ‘misleading’ and then tried to claim her point was actually that you could earn double that in London privately despite her earlier spluttering disbelief that consultants in ROI ‘of all places’ could earn 252k, ‘double, compared to the city of London’.

There’s a distinct lack of logic (and changing goalposts) that’s reminiscent of indignant teenagers 😂

If people listen to the BBC there will be no sympathy for them. Appalling coverage which always starts off qith their high pay and suggests qe shouldn't sympathise..
I work in nhs. Consultants, like everyone else, are on knees. No time for a piss, a glass of water, a lunch break. And holding responsibility for life and death, like nurses. Support them all if you want decent health care. And look behind the salary. Whatever people are paid ... no one in their right mind should want nhs staff working in the conditions we have right now.

Ignoring the blatant tosh being spouted on this thread.

I 100% support the strike. Consultants should be valued for their enormous expertise and also the fact they have to sacrifice so much of life for their career. Of course they're worth their pay staying in line with inflation.

I'm a medic. I left the NHS over ten years ago because the working conditions were crap. I can't imagine how difficult it must be now. I live in Australia. The pay for medics there is far far more than the consultants here are striking for. The flip side of free at the point of care medicine is that it really isn't valued in the same way.

And by the tosh I mean one particular poster.

88k isn't a high salary for someone with the academics and intelligence to become an NHS consultant.

If we want the brightest and the best to continue becoming consultants then we need to pay them properly.

The comparison is what other professionals on their level get paid which is well over £100k (lawyers, consultants, bankers etc) NOT someone on minimum wage with all D's at GCSE...

@ladykale - but consultants should have different expectations from other professionals.

Seems they’ve also taken an oath to not expect to be paid fairly and commensurate with their academic qualifications, extensive training, long hours, hard work, not to expect reasonable working conditions with adequate staffing etc

So, it seems no sympathy for them.

The average salary for a lawyer is about £60k. (I am one). The only lawyers on £100k plus are working silly hours in the city/major regional firms or very senior in-house. That’s a minority. It’s a bit disingenuous that doctors only want to compare themselves to the very highest paid of other professions, and not the average.

The pension remains stonkingly generous too.

For full disclosure, DH’s salary after 7 years as a consultant is about £120k. That’s for 12 PA’s plus some managerial responsibility. As with junior doctors it goes up pretty consistently from 88k.

Taking into account his private practice, DH earns more than double what I do. I qualified as a lawyer after a similar training period in the same year.

Sorry but I don’t think there is the public support for this (RW not MN) that you think there is. I find the strike pretty revolting in a COL crisis even though my family would benefit.

Absolutely. Why wouldn't I? If I'm in need of healthcare at the expert level of a consultant, then I'd want them to not be overworked, underpaid, not supported as that's a shortcut to burnout and them leaving the profession or the country for something that uses their expertise and treats them like humans.

I really don't understand why there's so much bitterness in the responses.... I assume these people don't want the NHS to improve, they want it shut down and all healthcare to be private.

@Vinvertebrate - lawyer here too, not a partner. Work silly hours but not earning £100k plus.

I think it’s reasonable to compare consultants with lawyers at the top of their game, partners at a city/top regional/national firm or general counsel for a good company.

These will certainly be earning in excess of £100k plus bonus/perks.

"I qualified as a lawyer after a similar training period in the same year. "

Law degree + LPC + 2 years as a trainee you'd be a newly qualified solicitor by 25. So your husband would have been a Junior doctor? Presumably he then would have had a few more years specialty training and paying for his own exams - not really comparable to continuing professional development courses in my view (which were at least paid for by my firm). I am a solicitor too and I don't think the training (or workload whilst training and exam requirements and overall responsibilities!) are comparable. You clearly think differently.

There was 70% plus turnout in the ballot and 86% yes vote so I rather think that indicates support from Consultants.

Yes, consultants are absolutely furious about 40% pay cut- as any of you would be.

While the work environment is worse at the same time

I believe the public want NHS consultants in post to treat them so largely support this.

just a few don’t, those who want private healthcare system( where ironically consultants will be better paid than what they are asking for now)

I have had an outstanding career, I was fortunate. Many of my friends are medics, and are fabulous people with glittering careers and are very talented without question.

I am certainly not jealous. This is a ridiculously lame argument!

My issue isn’t with the profession, nor the principled consultants that work there - it is with the new crop of consultants whom feel they are entitled to rock star salaries and all the perks simply by graduating!! It doesn’t work like that folks.

I was using the current exam grading system, but even back in the 1990s we still needed A levels for a med place!
Nowadays it is ruthlessly hard to achieve a place, which might be part of the problem no? We are losing the opportunity to acquire so many talented and bright new med grads simply due to a lack of space. This to me is madness. We need them. We have the talent here. So let’s hope that is addressed.

That will help the NHS far more than fattening up the bloated wage packets of the already extremely well paid current consultants. In fact all we achieve by doing that is fast tracking early retirement, it is counter productive for the public and NHS in fact.

70% turnout for the vote and 86% voted in favour of strikes- is that the new crop of entitled consultants?

do you think bright people will be attracted to our NHS given erosion of salaries and the current work conditions?

Oh for heavens sake! People are not going to vote no to a pay rise are they! Do you want a pay rise yes or no - vote now - it’s hardly surprising they voted for MORE money is it.

Jesus wept

That does not mean there is public support for the strike, it simply means a consultant is thinking about a sports car upgrade or a place in the county.

Seemingly patient safety, the enormous back log, post pandemic cancer patients are all irrelevant in their decision making, which was made for personal gain.

It is a total disgrace.

Country

you should listen again to the reasons they are striking

All you’ve done is poo poo the posts of several consultants on this thread while bulldozing through your hyperbole about “rockstar salaries”, “private jets”, “second properties” and “fast cars”. Yet your consultant mates (who apparently have all those things as a result of ample private work) are altruistic and caring and would never strike for more money.

Just try resetting from broadcast to receive for ten minutes.

I heard the reasons repeatedly and I don’t agree with them.

1. Higher pay will attract more consultants - consultants already have a high level of pay in comparison to law grads or similar professions that require the same length of study and similar academic acumen. Medics over take law grads very very quickly on balance, and towards the end of their career making millions.

2. Higher pay will therefore benefit the NHS with extra staff attracted by higher salaries;

This is a highly flawed argument.

We need many more med places and better incentives to study medicine. We are restricting the entry point to medicine so severely in the U.K. why? It isn’t a lack of talent and ability, this needs addressing first.

More pay for older consultants will give them the option to retire much earlier, therefore we will lose many accomplished, highly experienced consultants in the NHS that can not be replaced readily by newer, less experienced consultants.

Those that want to work overseas, will anyway regardless of pay increases. People won’t remain in the U.K. solely for high rates of pay. It’s the whole package and opportunities that are available in major global cities - be it London or elsewhere.

Lastly, the actual cost of this pay demand is eye watering! Literally eye watering. Billions and billions. We could pay for so many extra nurses and HCPs by the bucket load which would ease the strain on the front line significantly.

You are only interested in lining your own pockets. That’s the bottom line. This is certainly not for the NHS, what a joke!

Your decision to vote was not made with integrity. I fear for the future of the health service with such greed because a fair part of the job is based on basic altruism - or it used to be, and now it is scoffed at with such vile cynicism on here with a typical comments that they are not mother Theresa or similar.

There is a sadness for me at the ruthlessness and lack of genuine compassion for the suffering this strike will cause, the gun at the heads of the worn out over worked working poor to fund your lavish lifestyles makes me sick to the stomach, and the near total evaporation of altruism and care for public safety should worry everyone.

You are still humans - dear consultants - and just as likely to need care one day for a stroke or a heat attack and let’s hope the next generation will treat and care for you - let’s hope they are not striking for more money when you most need them, and they see you as a human being and something other than ‘dirty work’

You have probably fast tracked the need now for medics not to be given the right to strike, given the obvious carnage and harm it causes.

It just sickens me. Truly it does, because it’s also pointless Labour and Cons agree on this matter. We can’t afford your pay demands. There is rare consensus on this subject. So what is even the point?

Enjoy your days off. I hope it rains.

You’ve heard the reasons but you haven’t listened, let alone thought about them.

How do you square People won’t remain in the U.K. solely for high rates of pay. It’s the whole package and opportunities that are available in major global cities - be it London or elsewhere. with fair part of the job is based on basic altruism - or it used to be, and now it is scoffed at with such vile cynicism on here with a typical comments that they are not mother Theresa or similar? Which is it - career opportunities and high pay or altruism? Because even you must recognise it can’t be both.

It can and should be both Blossom, it might take longer to combine your NHS work with private work but most manage it in time.

Altruism is offering to work for less in the NHS because it’s funded on a totally different financial model to private health care, this is recognised by almost everyone. Unless you would prefer to scrap caring for the poor altogether and bury the NHS?

The NHS can never be on an equal footing to private healthcare - surely that must be obvious even to you.

Aw no, I thought GCalltheway had cleared off as promised!
what nonsense they talk

88-119k is not assisting recruitment or retention of consultants in this country entirely because it is far lower than elsewhere

No matter what drivelGCslltheway spouts!

Lots of public support for this as they want theNHS to be staffed

GCalltheway will go in their private jet to a private hospital via their second home in the country anyway😂😂

No, there is not public support for this at all. I am not sure why you are laughing. What is funny? People dying? In agony?
Yes hilarious.

Revolting.

It can’t be both. Altruism precludes private work. Which is probably why relatively few NHS consultants undertake it and others choose specialties like A&E and ITU where there is no private work. And clearly only those who do undertake it are in “rockstar salary” territory. Your argument has as many holes as a colander.