Why are nurses always bottom of the list?

[TommyAndGinaAreHalfWayThere]

Why is it whenever public service pay rises are announced, nurses are always given less than other sectors.

I have nothing against teachers - I couldn’t do their job but why do they always get more than nurses? Genuine question.

It always seems to me that nursing is seen by the government as a “lesser job”.

Is there a wonder nobody wants to do it anymore? When I started university there were 300 students in our cohort. After one year this dropped to 200. By the time we graduated it had dropped to 150.

Off all the nurses I graduated with I would estimate that more than half have since left - myself included. I have a close friendship group from uni -

me - left after 7 years
friend 1 - left after 6 years
friend 2 - still nursing
Friend 3 - left after 4 years
friend 4 - left after 5 years
friend 5 - moved to Australia 😂

Is there any wonder? Over worked, under paid and generally treated like shit.

According to Office national statistics - average teacher wage is 30k, average nurse is 33k

That's way out of date. Starting salaries alone are about £31k for both professions, (more in London). The averages are closer to £40k.

But nurses are on the same AfC payscale as most other NHS staff. So if nurses get 3.6%, so does everyone else.

doctors are not under contract with AfC.

TBH it pisses me off that people think the NHS is staffed by ‘hard working doctors and nurses.’ There are plenty of clinical staff who don’t fall into those two categories and they never get a mention,

Nurses have to always cope with ‘whataboutery’ whenever they talk about their pay and conditions. Social workers do a hard job but they don’t work 12.5 hour shifts and certainly overnight

Thank goodness no one has trotted out the ‘why do nurses need degrees?’ offensive nonsense I usually see everywhere else. No way would nursing be demeaned like this if it wasn’t almost exclusively female. No one asks why physios need degrees.

Agree with this. They’ve also taken on an outrageous amount of roles traditionally done by doctors with no financial numeration or regard to the change in their role. Social Workers/teachers etc have huge responsibility/stresses etc; but they don’t hold someone’s life in their hands (in the immediate sense; I’m aware of the consequences of not recognising safeguarding issues). They will never miss Christmas Day with their families etc. Social Workers in particular have scope to progress up the career ladder quickly. Nursing is much more competitive. Also compare the job description of a band 5 nurse to a band 5 admin officer.. Not to mention the mandatory training nurses have to do in comparison to non clinical staff of the same grade. Even the training is hectic… they’ve far less holidays than arts students etc & their weekends are spent on the wards, and they’re paying uni fees to be exploited. It’s a disgrace their bursaries were done away with.

I can't think of many more stressful jobs than an A & E nurse, tbh

They are nowhere near paid enough

Ha well, thats their fault isn't it? almost all private sector workers could join a union but of course the public swallowed the crap that unions are bad, so voted in Govt's that heavily restricted their powers.

Ah! i hear the cry "but unions ruined the country" ... did they? when we had more people in unions, we had higher productivity but what have we had since their decline?
Almost 0% economic growth, wage stagnation and general feeling in the country to do as little as possible when at work.... eg Customer Service? no one gives a shit anymore.

Seems to me that the need for unions is greater than ever, its the awful management & government we keep getting that needs the shake up in the UK.

Bingo. Women need to start being more savvy and behave more like the (largely male) train drivers.

I get that driving trains isn’t the same as working in hospitals and they will feel that duty of care towards patients, but they still need to have some of that determined and resolute attitude to getting more pay.

Will that nursing wage include shift allowance? A nurse will get extra pay per hour when working nights and weekends which obviously teachers don’t do.

Teachers also work less weeks per year than a nurse and I believe that teachers wages take that into account?

oh dear!

The average is 37k, but like all averages, it includes (a tiny minority) those who earn a lot more ie band 7 and 8's and a lot less band 5 with just a 2 or 3 years experience.

Also includes shift and overtime.

In real terms, nurse pay is about 10% below the rates in 2010... and lower still compared to the 1980s.

Hence why so many people leave.... an admin worker in Babcock Marine earns more than a band 5 nurse, for a 35hr week & free parking!

YABU. No one cares about council workers. We're the very bottom of the list.

The NHS is a monopoly employer so it’s hard to work elsewhere- hence no competitive wage.

The RCN is toothless. Cullen capitulated to so many exemptions from the strike. Wards kept a reasonable level of staff. She even allowed outpatient treatments to be made exempt. The strike had minimal impact as a result.

NHS employs staff from poor countries who work here for some years and then send their money and return home to live in relative luxury. Those staff are a good percentage of our workforce and don’t vote for strike action.

Some nurses are living so hand to mouth they couldn’t afford to strike.

As the largest group of employees in the NHS they were shafted by agenda for change and placed on lower pay bands than comparable professions (eg physio, occupational therapists, pharmacists).

Moving up pay bands is difficult and competitive outside of London, with the majority of nurses trapped on the lowest pay and their entire career. Only management roles are valued. They don’t give a toss about the skillset of a nurse with 30 years experience vs a newly qualified.

It’s a female profession so devalued and treated like shit.

You think teachers don’t work nights and weekends? 🤣🤣🤣

I've worked in business all of my career. There are so many admirable women in senior management roles who tell me they started off their career as a nurse. I don't know if it's that nursing attracts talented people or if it's the experience gained while nursing - quick thinking, taking responsibility, collaboration, no time for politics, good communicators.

When I've asked why they left nursing the answer is usually along the lines of poor management, bad systems and the toll on lifestyle. The NHS loses a lot of talent.

I think that poster meant we don't get paid for it. Not that we don't do it.

Nursing and teaching are not comparable for many reasons. They only reason they get lumped together is that they are both caring, female dominated careers and in the past were the only two 'careers' that many women felt were open to them.

nurses are pretty well paid imo

True... thats why so many leave for better paid work elsewhere isn't it.. not least agency and then going back into the same hospital where they used to work...

The NHS has 27,000 nurse specific vacancies and have to recruit from all over the developing world... because of the poor retention rate yet you think they are well paid!

Lack of a union (which anyone is free to join) does not prevent anyone arguing their case for more pay in their job.

On the flip side, my NHS pay is set - no ifs or buts. I can't argue I am worth more (I am) and make a case to be given it, I can't leave for a competitor who will pay me more...

To be fair civil service pay rise is lower than nurses and hasn't been mentioned at all. 3.25% is actually a lot more than most people expected. All public sector workers need pay restoration though, it's not a race to the bottom or competition between sectors everyone is suffering from years of austerity still.

Band 5 starting salary is £29k newly qualified, for a newly qualified teacher it is £31k - your facts are incorrect

a band 5 nurse doesn’t get to higher than £40k (outside London) unless they take masters level qualifications and/or go management ie sister

Anyone can join a union you know? Many nurses are actually unison members which isn’t an industry specific union anyway

Not everyone can join a union... Police and Armed Services for example.

It annoys me too. I see senior teachers get a lot more for doing the same type of job as senior managers in health & social care. Educational psychologists as well. Why do they get paid £££’s more than other therapists?

It's because the majority of nurses are female so governments of all colours think they can push them to the back of the Queue and they won't complain too much. Historically nurses don't usually go on strike. Teachers have more males in profession and traditionally strike more. I agree it's not fair.

Mental health and some other social workers do work overnight. Every council in the country has an out of hours duty. Many social worker start early and work late. The two jobs differ, social workers dealing with children protecting them from sexual exploitation often drive miles to visit the children and are away overnight as well.