Government ‘already factored in a bigger NHS pay rise’

NHS Providers has challenged the government's statement that its one per cent proposed pay rise for NHS staff in 2021/22 is all that is affordable.

The organisation, who labelled the proposed increase as ‘disappointing’, has pointed to the detailed work the NHS did around implementation of the Long Term Plan in which the government assumed an NHS pay rise in 2021/22 of 2.1 per cent, not one per cent.

Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, said: "It is very disappointing that the government has said that a one per cent pay rise is all that is affordable when they know that the assumption was that the 2021/22 NHS pay rise would be 2.1 per cent and that this was covered by the NHS revenue settlement announced by Theresa May in June 2018. This settlement was then enshrined in a formal act of parliament, the NHS Funding Act 2020.

"These assumptions, published in June 2019 were, of course, made before the events of the last 12 months which have significantly strengthened the case for a larger pay rise for NHS staff. In a survey of trust leaders for our evidence to the NHS Pay Review Body, 82 per cent of respondents wanted a pay uplift of at least three per cent, with only 14 per cent saying it should be two per cent or less. Our submission also makes it clear that any pay rise would need to be fully funded by government so trusts don't have to cut other services.

"Some will think that the government is snatching planned pay rises from the pockets of deserving NHS staff so they don't have to fund the extra costs of Covid-19, which the chancellor personally committed he would meet. We assume that the Pay Review Bodies will take full account of these published assumptions in the recommendations they make."