For all those who support the strikes

[chopc]

Where do you think the money will come from for all the pay rises? Are you personally willing to pay more tax?
We all saw during the pandemic it is the poorly paid essential workers that kept the country going and they totally deserve more money than the claps they got. However will YOU be prepared to contribute to the pot ?

If not where do you think the govn will find more money from?

The £35 billion lost each year to unrecovered tax - fraud and evasion - might help.

Personally I'd be keen to go after some of that. Very hard to understand why the Tories don't tackle this issue...

If my tax burden increases I will go on strike to get more income.

Exactly!
I thought the whole point of Brexit was so those at the bottom got wage increases, as it cost us to be in the EU and there was artificial wage suppression from migrant workers.

So either this was a lie and there is no money in which cases heads should roll.

Or there is money from Brexit in which case the Tories should be using that.

I'd happily pay more tax, if I believed we had a competent government who would use it to improve the lives of most IK workers.

As it stands I think they'd use it to subsidise the shareholders of big business so I'm not happy to pay more, no

Yes but to you and all the others proudly declaring that you would pay more tax, I ask how much more?

The same question has already been asked by me and at least one other poster but funnily enough nobody has answered it.

How much more per year, in pounds sterling, would you pay in income tax to support public sector pay rises?

Saying “yes, I’d pay more” but not saying how much reminds me of the people who thought that an extra penny in the pound on income tax (a manifesto policy by an opposition party a few years ago to fund something specific) meant that they would be paying an extra penny per month. In total. Which of course they congratulated themselves on for being public spirited.

Completely agree with you, if by "de-funding" you mean increasing the NHS budget in real terms every year (ignoring the extra money they got fire COVID)

It's a valid question as I'm sure in reality most would grumble about rises in tax no matter how supportive they are.

The reality is that something major needs to be done if people want a functioning health service. For starters it is outrageous that HCAs are on just above minimum wage, no wonder we can't recruit anywhere near enough. Nurses are also leaving in droves, I have signed more leaving cards in the past few months than I have in the rest of my career. They aren't leaving as they're greedy, they're leaving as they've been able to secure jobs with much less stress but similar take home pay.

If terrifying how dire things are, I'd be scared to need admitting to hospital right now. Across the board HCPs are working well below safe numbers, ward numbers are bumped up by agency staff which isn't financially sustainable or good for patients. These tens of thousands of vacancies need to be filled or more will leave. People are still traumatised from covid, they're burnt out, they're exhausted and scared working so far under ratio each shift. It used to be there'd be peaks in winter which you knew were savage but there'd be light at the end of the tunnel; now there's not and its relentless. Maternity is on its absolute knees as well, you couldn't pay me to give birth in the current system.

Pay isn't the only factor but it would help retain people which in turn would address some of the other issues.

This is what they did to MPs. They scrapped the massive pensions (it's now contributory based) and gave them a pay rise. That is why their pay looks to have risen so much since 2010.

MP pay is now linked to public sector pay- in 2021 they got 0%, in 2022 2.7%.

For everyone saying scrap their expenses- how would you pay their staff? All MPs employ about 5 people on 'expenses'. Should they all just be sacked? Or should only rich people be MPs? Because if you scrap expenses, only rich people could afford to rent constituency offices, pay the staff, and buy everything necessary for the job.

If you stopped paying MPs their salary, and gave all the money to nurses instead, each nurse would get... £107.

Income tax is not the only way to generate taxes. We need to take a different approach and tax wealth not income.

Garys Economics - Who pays tax?

This man speaks so much sense, I would urge you to watch if you havent already heard of him.

Yes I see this term a lot on here but real terms spending has been going up

If we don’t pay more tax, we’ll pay more for healthcare anyway. Couple of months ago I had a private GP video call for £40 when I couldn’t get through to mine. I’ve paid £65 a time to see a physio as I just can’t get to see anyone on the NHS. FIL has spent £20k so far on private treatment after NHS wait lists were too long.

we are paying out for health insurance as well as taxes as we don’t think the NHS will always be there for us. Most middle class people will be paying more via insurance or private appointments. Might as well pay the same out in additional tax and have healthcare available to poor people as well as wealthy.

Also regarding pensions, they're good but they're not as good for new starters as once were. Consultants are leaving in droves as pension changes mean they are paying thousands extra in tax for pay they have essentially already been taxed on- not great when we have a chronic shortage of them anyway.

This will be controversial but I wouldn't pay more tax for some departments to have increases. If you look how departments pay like the MoD map across to NHS its ludicrous.

Yes I would. I benefit from good public services directly (eg NHS) or indirectly (living in a nice country with opportunities equally available).

I’d pay more for healthcare and decent travel networks.
The government seem to find ££ to subsidised the oil companies who currently have record breaking profits - maybe start there?
Our nurses can’t afford to be nurses, WTF are we going to do when they move abroad or go and work in Pharma or Research or change careers?

I'd happily pay tax (I'm just under the threshold at the moment).
Then they need to raise taxes on the ultra rich, the private jets and yachts type.

Better question is what is the alternative?

You might not like paying for wage rises but how would you feel if a loved one or yourself couldn't get medical treatment at all or if the only way was very expensive insurance or self funded?

Someone i knew as a child recently died of a heart attack, ambulance took over 2 hours, early 60s.

A better rewarded and happier nhs workforce would be more productive and increased retention, so less spent on agency workers.

£400bn was taken out of the rail industry in profit last year, money is there for them too.

£9bn lost in tax fraud because the Govt failed to investigate tax fraud, 11bn would give nurses a 11% pay rise.

"Completely agree with you, if by "de-funding" you mean increasing the NHS budget in real terms every year (ignoring the extra money they got fire COVID)"

Inflation has eaten up the budget.
There has been huge failures in workforce planning (hence 100000 vacancies), maintaining and investing in infrastructure and in social care which means patients can't be discharged.

None of this is the workers responsibility.

Not a popular view I suspect but I wonder whether public sector workers would be prepared to sacrifice their defined benefit pensions for a pay rise? With the government paying around 25% in pension contributions on top of their salary, perhaps one solution is award significant pay rises but reduce the pension?

So I pay 10% of my wage in pension contributions as a nurse and that is topped up by the Government by another 25% ? Are you sure ?

The same place they found the 44 million pounds to pay for the front bench MPs expense claims. I.e. not my pocket.

Yes I would pay more tax, as long as everyone paid more tax not just the working population (so income tax rose not NI rise). I don’t understand when people say NHS deserve more money but aren’t willing to pay for it themselves, where do they think the money comes from?

Rising salaries while prices keep going up just as fast seems rather pointless. Instead we need something like a universal basic income so that everyone can have a decent standard of living and more people will be able to continue spending.

Public sector wage rises alone will leave millions falling through the gaps, seeing their own living standards decline.

Where do you think the money will come from for all the pay rises? Are you personally willing to pay more tax?
We all saw during the pandemic it is the poorly paid essential workers that kept the country going and they totally deserve more money than the claps they got. However will YOU be prepared to contribute to the pot ?

not in the UK but the same would apply here if it happened: yes i am prepared to pay more tax.
But what i would want more than ever is efficient auditing and oversight of government spending and procurement policies.
Followed by an upgrade to the NHS in terms of processes and streamlining and the funding of enough admin staff to leave clinical staff free to do their jobs properly and with enough resources and good terms and conditions so that their health and that of the patients isn't being put at risk.

What you seem to be saying, OP, is it's shit. You know it's shit but you don't want to pay a penny extra to help improve it. Slow handclap.

@BirmaBrite

Its actually just over 20% @BirmaBrite , according to your employer’s website.

From www.nhsemployers.org/articles/pension-contributions-and-tax-relief:

For the 2019-20, 2020-21, 2021-22 and 2022-23 scheme years, employers are responsible for paying 14.38 per cent of contributions, with the remaining 6.3 per cent being funded centrally.

But what i would want more than ever is efficient auditing and oversight of government spending and procurement policies.

Efficient auditing I agree needs addressing, but due to transparency laws you can view all contracts awarded above PCR threshold online, and policies are also available to view.

^ this applies to all public spending not just nhs.

Raising taxes sounds more popular on mn but it wouldn’t go down as well with voters otherwise Labour would lead on it across the board rather than small yield changes.