NHS pay cuts proposed

[Emoo]

NHS Employers are proposing to freeze incremental pay progression for all staff groups, see here, and are in negotiation with the unions, see here and here. In return NHS staff would get "a commitment to provide a guarantee of 'no compulsory redundancies' for as many staff as possible".

This is in fact a pay CUT, with the burden preferentially falling upon those lowest on their salary scales. This would include nurses, doctors, allied health professionals, pretty much everyone working in the NHS. The only people unaffected are those already sitting comfortably on the top of their salary scales.

This comes on top of the 2-year cost-of-living freeze already imposed, representing a 3.3% per annum cut in real terms (using most recent inflation estimate).

Details of the proposal are not readily available, and the information below is based on an interpretation of the sketchy information provided.

For those of you who don't know how NHS pay works, here's an example. A newly qualified nurse gets £21,176. Over 8 years, their salary would gradually step up in annual increments to £27,534, reflecting their increased experience in the role. They would then remain on this salary unless they took on a different role with significant additional responsibilities. The recent proposals would mean that the nurse would earn £21,176 for an additional 2 years, and be 2 points behind on the payscale thereafter.

For a typical nurse, this would mean a cut of ~4% (compared to expected pay) in the first year, then ~7% thereafter until they reached the top of their scale.

I should point out that these increments are currently written into the contracts of NHS staff; they are not 'bonuses', and employees will have based their long-term financial planning on the expectation of getting them.

For newly qualified doctors and midwives, the situation could be even worse; midwives generally start on £21,176 and doctors on £22,523. Their second year pay would normally be ~20% higher, reflecting the transition from supervised to independent practice.

To me, it seems unfair and immoral that:

1. a pay cut is being termed a "freeze".
2. it preferentially affects those who earn the least.

What do others think?

Vivalebeaver is correct.

But the unpaid hours RN's and doctors work cover the fact that patients generally will cost the system hella more than what they ever pay in....

Also I paid into the NHS pension scheme the whole time I worked there and left the UK without it. Fuck it. I don't want it.

Can't you get what you paid in back? Surely you're entitled to something?

I have been working on it Viva and fighting for it but am ready to give up. I just wanted my contributions back.

But I am hearing from other NHS Nurses that have gone abroad taht you don't get it back.

That's shocking. When I left my pre-NHS job afetr 10 years I was given the option of keeping my pension where it is and having it when I retire or I believe taking the money. But there may have been some restriction about it having to go into another pension. I left it there.

Lovesthechaos

Wont you be entitled to a pension when you do reach retirement age proportionate to the number of years spent in the NHS? Otherwise it doesnt seem fair

I do not think it will be there when I retire. The NHS is unsustainable in it's current form.

LovestheChaos - you rock!!!

Anyone doubting Loves statement should google militant medical nurse.

I work in the NHS

I started work on 12k per annum as a graduate in 1998. My contemporaries in the private sector (with lower degrees and way lower A level grades - for example my best mate who flunked all her A levels and got a couple of D grades on resit) were on £25k with car allowances, private healthcare, gym memberships etc etc.

I remember conversations about this at the time. They thought I was crazy to accept a £12k salary but I was thinking longer term - yes the pay was rubbish but there was the pension...

Funnily enough, these same people are now griping about my pension. Apparently it's "not fair". To me, it was a choice I made.

Totally agree Twosoups. As far as I'm concerned a low(er) wage in the NHS was compensated for by an OK pension.

As a recent NQ midwife I was earning £10 an hour 2 years ago. I could have earned the same working a night shift stacking shelves in Tesco. Instead I'd trained for 3 years, done a degree and was responsible for peoples' lives. And I have missed out on the final salary pension NHS scheme.

Errr my dp works in the private sector and doesn't have a gym membership,car allowance or private healthcare.

Actually don't think I know anybody getting benefits such as those.

Think a lot of people working in the NHS really have no idea what working in the private sector is like.

I worked in the private sector for 12 years before joining the NHS so I know what its like. My DH has always worked in the private sector. I never had gym membership or a car, though I did have private healthcare and a final salary pension scheme, neither of which I have in the NHS. I also had a much better salary, even though it was for a non-graduate position.

My dp is highly qualified(2Xdegrees,years of experience) and he's never had perks such as you've mentioned,it's not the norm. There will be exceptions as there will be re pay being less in the public sector.Dp has seen a couple of jobs recently paying more in the public sector.

The fact is the current pension scheme in the public sector is unfair and unworkable.I don't particularly want my taxes funding other peoples stonking pensions which this country can ill afford particularly when ours will be crap.I'd rather my taxes went on public services we'll all benefit from.

It's tough out there,stop whinging and poke up with it like the rest of us have had to for the last couple of years.

it's now time for all 'public sector' workers to come back into the real world we have a small engineering business and our guys had their last pay rise 18 months ago (the 1st for 2 and 1/2 years) and certainly do not expect annual increments etc. they get 'perks' such as being paid when they come in a bit late or have to nip out to the doctors, borrow the lorry when they want to transport large items etc, in return they stay a bit later if they have to on the same hourly rate as their day rate - if we are short of work for them they often offer to go early and loose a bit of pay - in short we all pull together - not whinge and whine
about everything - if we have a good year they get a bonus - if things are tight they pull their belts in - IF YOU ARE IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR AND DON'T WANT TO STAY IN YOUR JOB LET ME KNOW BECAUSE WE'LL GLADLY TAKE YOUR PLACE. - and yes I do have experience of local government directly because I used to work there

ok molly you can have my job.
You get to work christmas day, new year day and every other bank holiday day, weekends and nights.

You dont get time allowed to go to the GP in work time because you will leave the service short. You dont get to come in late. We dont get bonuses for being productive and seeing more patients or for improving the service. Thats called job satisfaction.
When you stay over because of staff shortages and patient need you do not get paid for that. Period. You dont expect to finish shift on time

When its snowing and freezing like it is now, if a patient needs seeing to at 2am and you are on the district, you abandon the car and walk for 20 minutes for the patient to get seen.

There are no material perks at all. Apart from the pension apparently

In return you get abuse from the public because you dont give them what they think they are entitled to even though you try to explain that what they want is not justifiable, then there is the endless carping about the approx £5000/year pension that you my get if you are lucky.

Oh dont worry , I'm biding my time, soon as I can jump ship I will.

MollyMole - if you really want my job so much I suggest you come and work for the NHS 37 hours a week unpaid for 3 years while doing a degree like I had to do to become qualified. Then you will be able to do my job, you'll only be paid £10 an hour and have to work nights, weekends and Xmas Day. You'll have to look after about 15 women and babies at a time, inc high risk women and babies. You won't get to go the loo, you won't get a drink and the only "perk" I get is helping myself to antibiotics from the drugs cupboard for my constatnt UTIs due to having a full bladder all shift. But if you want the job there are plenty of vacancies.

It's quite simply really. As much as I'd love to pay more into the NHS and give our wonderful nurses & doctors more money, we cannot afford it.

Any increase in spending either has to come from cuts elsewhere, borrowing or increased taxes.

Like many, I work in the private sector and haven't had a payrise this year, last year I got a whopping 0.5% and I very much doubt I'll get a rise next year too. Instead I count my lucky stars I still have a good job and keep my head below the parapet. So you will find little sympathy from us in the private sector to pay more taxes simply so that someone else can have a payrise.

We can't borrow more money either. It should be obvious to a blindman that we can borrow no more.

So that leaves cuts elsewhere. Please suggest where else in the government expenditure you wish to cut. Social security? Perhaps the poor would like to go without so a nurse can have a payrise? Education? Perhaps little johnny would like to go without a teacher or a book? What about defence? Sorry Sergent, go charge that hill with a bayonet. We've ran out of bullets because we had to save another £x billion so the good doctor's and nurses in blighty can have their god given annual payrise.

Actually defence is a pretty good one. Stopping the war should save a shedload.

Stopping unnecessary consultancy is another.
Not trying to instigate such massive and costly change in the NHS when it is already trying to cut back.

There are many things that can be dont to genuinely save money if one chooses, without hitting services and the poor.

Increments are actually not payrises as such although i appreciate they do look that way.

They are there for the increased experience and responsibility that comes with each year. There is quite a difference in responsibility between those at the bottom of a band and those at the top.

Be under no illusion this will lead to a shortage of nurses yet again. Large numbers of people are due to retire, student numbers are beijng cut back and this sort of thing does not make the professions attractive to young people.

Eventually patient care will suffer as a result of these policies. At which point everyone will be sucking up the consequences.

done not dont.

"Actually defence is a pretty good one. Stopping the war should save a shedload."

The total defence budget for the UK is £38 billion.

The Government is on track to overspend by about £140 billion this year.

So even if we dropped our entire spending on defence we'd still be living beyond our means and have to do something about it.

We've basically become far to accustomed to living a life style that we simply cannot afford. If we can sort something out now we can avoid the fate of somewhere like Ireland or Greece where you have seen genuinely savage pay cuts rather than the mere freeze we get here (and I say that as someone who's had to put up with a pay freeze for the last three years).

"There are many things that can be dont to genuinely save money if one chooses, without hitting services and the poor."

Well that's what the pay freeze appears to be, a method of generating savings without hitting services and without extra job losses.

What about tax avoidance then? What about a lot of things taken in cumulation that will add up to near that total?

This will hit the poor. This payfreeze will also affect teh HCA's, porters and admin staff that are relied on heavily to provide the service. Alot of these people are on minimum wage.

Oh and this wont stop job losses. There is no cast iron guarantee that jobs will not be lost.

I'm not bothered about not having an annual payrise. I accept that, I know people have to tighten their belts and I'm more than happy to not have an annual payrise.

An NHS band increment is something totally different. Staff took paycuts under Agenda for Change on the understanding that there would be increments. You can't keep screwing over the same group of people. First the big pay cuts, then fucking over the pensions in two seperate areas, then the pay freeze and now announcing the increment freeze. I think all those 4 things combined are a bit too much.

Tax avoidance is being clamped down upon but even then will only bring in a fraction of what is needed.

Make no mistake we are overspending by £140-£160 billion per year

Wastage, tax avoidance, benefit fraud etc whilst have their part to play, can only do so much.

It's like saying you earn £2000 a month but you must borrow £1000 every month to meet your outgoings. Sure cutting your Sky subscription of £20 a month will help but it really isn't going to make a big enough dent.

"What about tax avoidance then?"

Avoidance, which is legal but morally questionable, or evasion which is illegal?

The recent protests against Topshop for tax avoidance claimed that £100 billion is lost over four years to avoidance. So that's allegedly (very very allegedly) £25 billion a year, again compare that to the Government's £140 billion overspend.

The maths are quite simple, previous Governments have been spending far too much compared to their earnings and have been living off of credit cards to pull it off. We've not become spoilt and indulged, used to a lifestyle beyond our means, a lifestyle that we really cannot afford.

"Oh and this wont stop job losses. There is no cast iron guarantee that jobs will not be lost."

No, and that's the same all round in both the public and private sectors.

However trying to control the expenditure on wages without sacking people is one of the first things you can try to do when you need to balance the books.

The other option is mass sackings or serious wage cuts, which has got the be the worse option.