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Unions agree pay deal for NHS workers
Health unions have accepted a deal for 1.3m NHS workers that will see pay rise by at least 6.5% over three years.
Unions, including Unite and the Royal College of Nursing, will recommend the deal to their members. The £4.2bn agreement will lift the 1% cap on public sector pay rises for NHS staff after police and prison officers were exempted in September.
The government introduced the cap in 2013 after a two-year freeze as part of its attempt to reduce the budget deficit. The government has come under pressure since losing its majority at the 2017 election to soften its stance on public sector pay amid weariness with its austerity programme.
The deal will give workers at the top of their pay band a 3% increase in the first year with smaller increases in the following two years. Workers lower down the pay scale and new joiners will get bigger increases with some receiving 29% more over three years.
Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, despite being been a figure of intense dislike from many healthcare professionals during his time in charge of the department, tweeted: "Delighted to confirm pay rise of between 6.5 and 29% for NHS staff who have worked so hard over a tough winter, in a £4.2bn deal. Rarely has a pay rise been more deserved."
The pay rise is funded by new money from the Treasury and not from existing NHS funding. It covers workers, not including doctors and dentists, in England but is likely to be extended to other countries in the UK. The deal could spark further increases for public sector workers as wage growth picks up.
With inflation running at 2.7% a year the real impact for workers at the top of their pay bands, which make up about half those covered by the deal, will be minimal. But the agreement brings to an end years of squeezed incomes for NHS staff as prices have risen faster than wages.
Unite national officer for health Sarah Carpenter said: "At long last, after eight years of pay austerity, there has been a significant recognition that this harsh pay regime imposed on hard working and dedicated NHS staff can no longer be sustained. This is something, we believe, the government should have done a long time ago - and they should do so now for other public sector workers."