According to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Danny Alexander, the 1% pay rise paid to some but not all NHS workers is all that the country can afford. The Scottish government will also be adopting the NHS Pay Review Body's recommendations in full; so all NHS staff in Scotland will receive the 1% pay rise. The government is likely to reap what it is they have sown as trade unions are about to ballot members on taking industrial action. This may be the straw that breaks the camel's back.
The Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, has said that implementing the pay body's recommendations in England would be unaffordable and that it would risk the quality of patient care. He added that if everyone in the NHS were to receive the 1% rise then approximately 6 000 nursing jobs would have to be cut. It was, however, only recently that the government was openly boasting about the economic recovery claiming that the nation was feeling the benefits of this economic upturn and then in the same breath had the audacity to treat health workers in such a disgraceful way.
Paramedics and other NHS staff are set to face yet another year of financial hardship, after it has been announced by the government that most health service workers from next month are to receive a 1% pay rise. The pay rise amounts to less than half the current consumer price index inflation rate of 2.7%, in effect this means that staff are having their pay cut after two long hard years of pay freezes. The 1% pay increase will be paid to paramedics, nurses, healthcare assistants, porters and maintenance staff who are covered by the Agenda for Change initiative.
General practitioners are set to receive a 1.3% ‘contract uplift’ which covers their pay and the cost of running their practices. The Doctors' and Dentists' Review Body had recommended that the wages of general practitioners should be increased by 2.29%.
‘Paramedics and other NHS staff are set to face yet another year of financial hardship’
The grossly insulting 1% pay rise will send an interesting message out to paramedics about the value the government places on their work. Undervaluing the work of healthcare workers in this way will send the wrong message out to staff.
The freezing of pay will do little to raise morale in a service that is already demoralised and will add to the already financial misery that is faced by thousands of health care workers. All of this is against a backdrop of massive reorganisation within the service and with staff having to deal with job cuts, rationing and the ever-increasing number of patients. In spite of delivering considerable efficiency savings and at the same time having to face increasing workload pressures and increased patient demand, this government has chosen to demonstrate to paramedics that this is what they are worth, this is how they value them, this government has shown complete disrespect for paramedics and other staff in the NHS.
The government continues to take advantage of paramedics and other health care workers because they know they are professional at their work, this derogatory pay rise is tantamount to abuse.
What is important and what matters to patients is how this will affect care. The conclusion of the public inquiry into the appalling atrocities at Stafford Hospital was for a call for more compassionate care. However, there is a possibility that the pay award will demoralise staff thus thwarting that ambition.
The Point of Care Foundation (2014) in its report has considered the importance of having an engaged and happy workforce and that this was essential to providing good quality care. The 1% pay rise will go little way to encouraging engagement or making a happy workforce.