NHS pay offer: is 5.5% the first step to a fair deal for nurses?
Posted 23 August 2024 - 01:00
Whether it’s a step forward or not nearly enough after years of pay stagnation, have your say
Is this year’s 5.5% Agenda for Change pay rise enough for nursing staff?
You may very reasonably say not – but whatever you think, nursing unions want to hear from you and have opened consultations.
Looking for a sign of better pay to come for NHS staff
The dilemma is: does the consolidated award give NHS staff the confidence they crave that they are on the first step towards fairer pay, or is it just too little right now?
Nurses, nursing associates and healthcare support workers are crying out for a show of good faith from ministers in a Labour administration that is fresh to governing. Some in the profession may be willing to trust that the award heralds better days to come.
For some, it might seem reassuring that the 5.5% figure is the independent NHS Pay Review Body’s recommendation, and not something whittled down by Downing Street.
Others, though, might take the view that signs of good faith don’t pay the bills, or improve dire nurse retention, and that this award is no more than a paltry promise of ‘jam tomorrow’. A tomorrow that might never come.
What the numbers say – nurses’ offer, doctors’ deal and real-terms pay cuts
Hard numbers matter. This 5.5% is certainly not flattered by comparison with the 22.3% over two years awarded to junior doctors. Nor does it make much of a dent in the almost 30% real-terms pay cut nursing staff have seen over a decade of pay stagnation, as outlined in the RCN’s evidence to the review body.
‘Exhaustion or perhaps cynicism about the pay-setting process might well breed apathy, but this would be to miss an important opportunity’
The college and Unison have each opened consultations on the issue with their NHS members in England. If you’re in this group, your response – if you choose to give one – will be personal to you, informed by your professional and domestic circumstances, and possibly your politics too.
Chance to use your collective voice on pay for the profession
Many nursing staff are feeling deeply bruised by years of real-terms pay contraction and latterly, unprecedented industrial action. Exhaustion or perhaps cynicism about the pay-setting process might well breed apathy, but this would be to miss an important opportunity.
Nursing staff are being invited to use their collective voice, through their unions, to shape pay campaigning.
‘Voting’ in these consultations is that chance, whether you’re prepared to trust that 5.5% points to fairer pay to come or not.