To be disgusted that nurses may be striking for a 17% pay rise!

[justonemire]

Of course nurses should receive a fair salary and of course they have as much right as anyone else to ask for a pay rise. However to ask for a pay rise that is 5% above the current 12% inflation rate is just ridiculous and never going to be approved.

The average nurses salary is £35.600 and this would equate to a pay rise of £6.150.

Yes nurses do a great job but so do a lot of other key workers in the public sector who have only received 2%

The government simply cannot accept the nurses pay demands because if they do everyone else would go on strike for a similar deal. Where would it end.

Therefore the outcome is that people will not receive the proper level of care we are all paying taxes for. If there are strikes then The NHS will be run as if it is Christmas Day. God help us and our loved ones then.

There will be resulting misdiagnosis and deaths and where will the fault lie? Yes you can blame the government, Putin for invading Ukraine and pushing up food and energy costs, etc but I think we will also all blame the nursing profession too for asking for a completely unrealistic 17% pay rise.

Nurses and teachers are SO fucking underpaid in the UK. Its getting where there are huge shortages of both in the south east, because how is a nurse on 30k married to a teacher on 35k supposed to afford £1,500 a month on childcare, 2,000 on rent or mortgage, not to mention food, elec/gas, water, other bills.

Its ridiculous

I did a quick Google search and found 35k.

"What Is The Average Salary For A Nurse?
The Royal College of Nursing estimated in 2021 that the average annual salary of an NHS nurse is £33,384. The pay rise introduced across the NHS in 2022 means that average is probably now closer to £35,000."

www.nurses.co.uk/blog/a-quick-overview-of-nurses--salaries-in-the-uk-in-2022/

Solidarity with the strikers!

Nurses next, midwives, teachers etc. Do they have a point, yes of course . Do I support them- yes!

OP you say that by nurses striking, patients won’t receive the care they pay their taxes for.
Let me reassure you as a nurse of nearly 30 years patients currently and for some time are definitely not getting that level of care. There are more staff in cafes serving tea and cakes than on 30 bed wards. It’s an absolutely impossible situation.
Who wants to come and work 13 hr days and nights, with huge responsibilities, a tea break on rare occasions and never ever feel satisfied that all your patients were cared for properly or even seen for more than 5 mins that day.
Come and try it.
That is why we are striking, it’s as much for patient care and safety as it is for our profession.

I think nudes deserve it, horribly underpaid profession.

me three!

I meant nurses! Although, I’m sure nudes are underpaid as well!

My point precisely! But I’m sure these people are all paid more than nurses.

The Nhs money pit. Doesn’t matter how much money you throw at it, it will devour it and it will come back for more.

YABVVVVU you can't retain well skilled nurses who literally save human lives from cradle to grave if they are not paid a decent student bursary (and no fees) or a more than decent wage. Public sector workers have had a real pay cut while the tories have been in government and yet you probably banged a saucepan for them on Thursday nights at 8 o'clock. Their all likely to be suffering from PTSD following the pandemic no wonder they would rather work at Lidl who pay better

This is one case where the voting buttons would have been a good idea. Up the workers, OP. Nurses need this increase to get back to the same level they were on years ago.

Nurses are paid on average $75,000 in the US. Around the same in Canada.
I really support the strikes - we’re one of the most advanced countries in the world and our wages should reflect this

Didn't the poor poor barristers get a 15% rise🤔 I know who I'd rather give a pay rise to and if it was up to me it would not have been the barristers (my sister in law and her husband are barristers, they are minted). I fully support the nurses strike, they should be paid properly for the job they do, nurses are leaving in large numbers, it's dangerous working short staffed. My mum was a nurse for 40 odd years it is so underpaid and undervalued (and dam hard graft!), our nurses are amazing we need the pay to reflect the job they do and retain the amazing nurses we do have.

We go into it to help people of course, but never expected to be so undervalued and taken for granted for it.

This does cause a problem down the line though as the pay between salary bands gets ever closer.

Some senior NHS staff got just over 2% this year and the band below got around 4 I think. The issue is that there is so much more responsibility in the higher bands. It has the potential to get to the point where there isn’t any value in getting promoted as there’s a lot more stress and not much salary differentiation, so although a standardised payrise is welcome over nothing at all, it isn’t necessarily a great overall fix.

I see what you’re saying op, and I’ve seen others elsewhere complaining that nurses are relatively well paid already.
But the question is relative to what. Compared to the nurses of the baby boomer era they’re not. Compared to that era, when work was expected to pay and very few had alternative immense private incomes made out of nothing, none of us are well psid. Compared to the cost of living we are all screwed and have been since the bloody Blair era.

Also compared to minimum wage, jobs requiring education have nothing like the pay that they used to. It’s already not worth working hard as care assistants, teaching assistants, IT help desk assistants, or any other public sector assistants requiring education when you can get a relatively easy job as a cleaner for the same amount. Turn up, wipe a few tables, no stress from the public, no real responsibility, and take home the same as all those hard working staff without whom we can’t educate kids, maintain the lives of the old, maintain the equipment and communications necessary in our era, and help people to get to hospital and keep well. The situation is ludicrous and it has to stop somewhere.

There’s even been talk of raising minimum wage, which will wipe out the extra paid to even more responsible jobs, especially when we expect them to pay for the education needed to do them too!

So no, I don’t think it’s unreasonable, and if other people are just whinging because they want to be paid more too then let’s have the general strike we should have had 20 years ago when hard work and achievement was rendered meaningless by the return to inheritance.

All they are asking for is to be paid the same in real terms as they were in 2010.

I'm 2010 public satisfaction with the nhs was 70%. Today it's 35%.

Pay a fair wage, more people join the service, the service improves.

What's part is a bad idea.

There comes a point when enough is enough and you vote by withdrawing your labour as is your democratic right

The NHS is haemorrhaging people as some can get better pay and less stress stacking shelves so it is not just about pay but the lack of staff and conditions

Do I support the nurses ? Yes even though I know it will have an impact on the wider population in routine stuff not emergency stuff

The NHS of today is not the NHS when it was created

Money is there but you have to fight for what you believe in

Pay cut for MP’s and associated perks and expenses to help pay for the nurses pay rise ?

You need to read up on which barristers were asking for the pay rise here. These were the criminal barristers and some weren’t taking home much more than £20k.

I supported them too.

You're right OP. Why should I expect to work in a unit staffed well enough to ensure I get to go to the toilet, have a break or have something to eat in a 12.5 hour shift, how ridiculous of me.
The staffing crisis will only get worse if we don't do something.

Do you think anyone can provide safe, effective care in those conditions?!

Op you should feel ashamed of yourself

Not all nurses are band 5. People going on that a nurse earns £35k.
As we now have qualified band 4 nursing associates who take on just as much as a band 5 nurse. I'm on £23k.

Didn't the poor poor barristers get a 15% rise🤔 I know who I'd rather give a pay rise to and if it was up to me it would not have been the barristers (my sister in law and her husband are barristers, they are minted)

If they’re minted then they won’t be criminal barristers, FFS. I wouldn’t do their job for the pay - much less than a nurse btw despite tougher entry requirements.

I’m on the fence with the nurses’ strike. Care has been piss poor for decades. Successive governments just kick the NHS shitshow can down the road. The pension is bloody amazing and £35k is a great salary in much of the UK. If nurses get 17% then doctors will want 20+ - at some point, enough is enough.

I'm not a nurse but have worked closely with them. Things I have observed;

• Many nurses do not receive a break in 12 hours (due to ongoing staff issues)
• They are often shouted at by managers and patients
• If someone calls in sick they may have to manage *Some buildings have no air conditioning. Imagine working in a heatwave with gloves and masks on.
• They have to make fast decisions and problem solve in awful conditions
• They saved us when Covid happened and still worked when we had no idea how Covid could impact the health of themselves and family members
• I often saw nurses in tears when they were unable to manage with no staff.

To be honest OP you have no idea. It's shocking that you should think these people should look after you in these conditions and without a substantial pay rise.

I was a Nurse for 40years,highly qualified and was underpaid the entire length of my career.

When I retired conditions were nowhere near as bad as they are now,also we didn’t get the abuse like nowadays.

I fully support the strike.Look how much our politicians earn! They made millions each during Covid.

This Country is in crisis,what it will take to recover from this?

Go Nurses.