Editorial

Paltry pay award is an immoral affront

It is hard to believe that the global financial crisis started eight years ago, and even harder to fathom why NHS staff are still being forced to pay for the mistakes of others. Yet the annual confirmation that nurses and their colleagues will receive another pitiful pay award was announced last week, and there is no prospect of improvement until 2021 at the earliest.

It is hard to believe that the global financial crisis started eight years ago, and even harder to fathom why NHS staff are still being forced to pay for the mistakes of others. Yet the annual confirmation that nurses and their colleagues will receive another pitiful pay award was announced last week, and there is no prospect of improvement until 2021 at the earliest.

The 1% award was trailed by chancellor George Osborne last summer when he tied the hands of the supposedly independent NHS Pay Review Body (RB) to such an extent that it had no room for manoeuvre. Successive governments have interfered in this way for so long that it is tempting to argue that the RB should be scrapped.

It is hard to fathom why nurses are still paying for the mistakes of others

But wait. The RB still serves a purpose and this year its seven members have asserted their independence in various ways. For example, it points out in its report that the policy of squeezing public sector pay that has been in place for the past decade will not be sustainable for much longer, not least because workloads, agency costs and staff turnover are all on the rise.

The RB has also flagged up the potential impact of scrapping bursaries for nursing students. It fears that the quality and quantity of recruits could suffer once students are forced to rely on loans to fund their training from next year, with a negative effect on an already overstretched workforce.

NHS trusts and health boards have been criticised for failing to engage with staff, not least because of the link with patient outcomes. The RB has called for working groups to be set up to identify innovative practice in this respect, with organisations that have fallen behind being expected to catch up.

Unfortunately, the RB’s remit does not cover the moral argument for nurses and other NHS staff to be better paid, but consider this: staff in the financial sector shared bonuses of £13.6 billion during 2015, according to the Office for National Statistics. That’s almost £10,000 for every member of NHS staff. Immoral? You decide.

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