12.5% is what staff deserve, RCN tells pay review body
Intended for healthcare professionals
News Previous     Next

12.5% is what staff deserve, RCN tells pay review body

Jo Stephenson

Nurses dealing with the twin pressures of COVID-19 and chronic staff shortages deserve a 12.5% pay rise, the RCN has told the body that advises the government on NHS pay.

Nursing Standard. 36, 2, 7-7. doi: 10.7748/ns.36.2.7.s4

Published: 03 February 2021

ns_v36_n2_4_0001.jpg

Picture credit: Getty

Nurses’ experiences of working during the pandemic and the severe strain caused by staff shortages feature in the college’s official submission to the NHS Pay Review Body (RB).

The independent body is responsible for advising the governments of all four UK nations on pay for NHS staff. It takes evidence from trade unions, employers and governments to inform its recommendations.

The RCN’s submission – which had yet to be made public as Nursing Standard went to press – sets out why the college is calling for a fully funded pay rise of 12.5% for all staff on Agenda for Change (AfC) contracts. The evidence submitted ‘makes the economic case for a pay rise, while stressing the link between fair pay, recruitment, retention and safe staffing’, the RCN says.

It argues that ‘chronic staff shortages have impacted on the system’s ability to cope with the pandemic, as well as ongoing service demands’. The college estimates that there are 50,000 nurse vacancies across the UK.

Increase good for wider economy

The document also draws on a recent report by consultancy London Economics, which concluded a ‘long overdue’ pay increase for nurses would help boost recruitment and retention and benefit the wider economy.

The report said higher salaries for nurses would mean they would pay more tax, could pay off students loans sooner and would have more disposable income.

RCN general secretary Dame Donna Kinnair urged members to keep on pushing for a pay rise.

‘It is time to pay nurses fairly – let’s redouble all our efforts to make 2021 the year the tide turned’

Dame Donna Kinnair, RCN general secretary

‘Members of the RCN have been extensively involved in our pay campaigning in the past six months and I am urging even more of you to become vocal and visible in the next six months,’ she said.

‘It is time to pay you fairly – let’s redouble all our efforts to make 2021 the year the tide turned.’

In December, the government delayed a decision on a pay rise for nurses and other NHS staff on AfC contracts until at least May, even though the current three-year pay deal expires in March.

The delay was confirmed in a letter from health and social care secretary Matt Hancock to the RB that emphasised the need for pay recommendations to be affordable.

It said: ‘The affordability of pay recommendations will have to be considered within the context of the significant financial and economic pressures that have resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic, both within the NHS and wider public finances.’

‘Needless delays’ in pay process

In January the RCN joined with other health unions, including Unison and the Royal College of Midwives, to write to prime minister Boris Johnson, calling for an end to ‘needless delays’ in the pay process.

Mr Johnson had faced criticism from unions earlier in the month after he told MPs that nurses had already received a 12.8% pay rise.

Responding to a question from Labour party leader Sir Kier Starmer on public sector pay on 6 January, Mr Johnson said: ‘There’s been above-inflation pay increases for public sector workers, nurses in particular have had a 12.8% increase over the last few years.’

He was referencing the current three-year pay deal agreed between the government and unions in 2018, the last installment of which was implemented in April 2020.

Touted as the biggest salary increase for nurses in a decade, it led to pay increases of at least 6.5% for most staff after years of pay restraint. However, at the lower end of the pay scales, newly qualified nurses’ pay increased by more than 12%.

But Professor Kinnair said Mr Johnson’s statement was demoralising and ‘not a statement nursing staff will recognise’.

‘Staff are worse off now than they were in 2010, following years of freezes and awards that were capped below the level of inflation,’ she said. ‘Experienced nursing staff are 15.3% worse off in real terms.’

rcni.com/pay-review-submission

Share this page