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.

nurse.org/articles/highest-paying-countries-for-nurses/
Wow, the disparity is disgusting. The UK definitely underpays and undervalues its staff.

I was a top band 6. That involved being in charge of one of the PICU's with 8 patients and 8 staff under me.
I was responsible for every patient in that unit. would have to know every detail about their medical condition, expected problems, and treatment plan, also manage the staff, making sure the staff were capable for the patients they had and supervising and mentoring the more junior staff. dealing with any emergencies and initiating resuscitations, altering ventilation, dealing with controlled drugs, Inserting cannulas, taking blood for tests, checking medications with all the nurses, making up IV's dealing with families, emergency admissions, social workers, and police. carrying out sickness reviews and performance reviews,
on top of that making sure we had enough medications/fluids/emergency equipment for the shift, doing rounds with consultants, checking blood results, running blood gases, doing ECG,s, organising relief for staff for breaks and bathroom. Dealing with child death and bereavement. dealing with major trauma,s, and tragedies. Often we would have no support staff, so on top of that, I would be running around getting feeds, nappies, drugs, and equipment and answering the bloody phone because they wouldn't employ support staff. Dealing with sudden staff sickness and having to juggle staff around to taking a patient while trying to also run the unit.

For all that I received £34k with 30 years of ICU experience and multiple courses to improve my skills.
Due to the increase in professional fees, car park fees, and pension contributions I was taking home the same in 2020 as I was in 2010.
I left

And when your taxes go up 17% you will not be able to complain and it is to pay for everyone having a salary increase!

Good Police deserve good pay, too.
Often police have to deal with mental health crises-
and are almost Social Workers in some instances.

All arguments apart, where is the money coming from? Not just nurses but all those demanding huge pay rises. There is no money!

What is more abhorrent, professionals refusing to do the job they were trained to do, saving lives/treating sick people or the government for putting us/them in this position?

Info i've been reading online suggests that starting salaries post qualification are around 27K. is that correct? If so the starting salary would seem fairly generous compared to other graduates roles (just had my 3rd child graduate). Is it more the issue that it doesnt increase quickly enough once qualified?

Nurses have my full support.

1. Feel free to become a nurse or to recommend it to one of your children.
2. It is not a race to the bottom.
3. Other professions should and will be striking to achieve a better pay deal.
4. Check out the pay rises received by MPs compared to nurses and other public sector employees in the last ten years.

You sound delightful

@Fanacapan

No money huh. That's weird. The govt seemed to be able to find millions to give to their dodgy mates for PPE...

Therese, you don't have to do this any more.

There is no money!

There’s always money. If I was chancellor I could find it.

There are many things I'm "disgusted" by at the moment, OP.

I'm disgusted that Matt Hancock is cashing in on the pandemic by releasing his vile book and now pissing about in the jungle.

I'm disgusted that men like Gavin Williamson continue to get promoted despite bullying and intimidating behaviour.

I'm disgusted by Suella Braverman generally.

Perhaps most of all I'm disgusted that our NHS has been systematically starved of funds for over decade while successive Governments and the right wing press try to blame HCP's for its shortcomings.

Anyone who thinks Nurses striking for fair pay, having endured years of real terms pay cuts, staff shortages and risking their lives in a pandemic, are the enemy needs to get a fucking grip.

I'm not a nurse btw.

Yes they do earn £35,000 a year as of 2022. Where is your data saying they don’t?

ons agrees the average nurse is on £35K

indeed a starting salary is over £27 K

please get your facts right before you start or quote correctly

Shows how unhelpful 'average pay' figures are.

I know a lot of nurses and the vast majority are band 5 even after decades in the role - my sister's dept don't let you go pt unless you go back to band 5 so almost everyone has to go down after mat leave or leave. My sister a specialist nursing degree and only made it above 30k in her forties....(by leaving her patient facing role).

It's a really poor profession for pay and conditions and it's not at all fair that nurse's are not ever recognised for their expertise and level of education.

I would be really against any of my DC going into the NHS and that's sad and worrying, because we need good people to do it but they shouldn't have to take on jobs that mean they will not be able to get a mortgage or pay for childcare etc .

If you’d seen what they had to do during the lockdowns, you’d agree they deserve that pay rise as a bare fucking minimum.

I have several relatives who are nurses, one was fresh out of Uni, two are in their 40s, all have varying degrees of PTSD.

I absolutely support nurses in this.

I’m paid more than they are. I do a mid level finance job for a publishing company, it’s fast paced and sometimes stressful but I NEVER have someone else’s life in my hands.

Too right they should be paid more!

It's called being strategic.... they will campaign for a high increase knowing that realistically they'll get a lot lower.... but more then what they've been offered previously

I thought I agreed with a lot of what the OP said, and then read the thread...
Couldn't we find part of that money for nurses by reallocating some of the funding within the NHS?

Putin for invading Ukraine and pushing up food and energy costs

Inflation is not only due to covid and Ukraine. The sudden increase in supply demands after covid did cause some inflation but those issues soon rectified. Corporate profiteering/price gouging has also played a part.

From the report linked below:

 Profit margins for the UK’s biggest listed companies (FTSE 350) were 73% higher than pre-pandemic levels in 2019.

 UK-wide company profits jumped 11.74% in the six months from October 2021 to March 2022, according to the most recent ONS data.

 In the same period, labour income only rose 2.61%; and fell by 0.8% after accounting for inflation.

 This recent profit jump is responsible for 58.7% of inflation in the last half year – as opposed to just 8.3% due to labour costs.

www.unitetheunion.org/media/4757/unite-investigates-corporate-profiteering-and-the-col-crisis.pdf

This. My stepdaughter was pulling 13 hour shifts without a break in ITU two years ago. All her patients were dying. The effect on her mental health was appalling. Nurses deserve everything we can give them.

So @justonemire hasnt returned to engage with her ridiculous inflammatory post. What a surprise.

You have expressed perfectly my sentiments.

I support nurses, the conditions they work in are terrible. They deserve every penny. If they were properly paid maybe we’d be able to attract and retain people to be nurses.