UK government rejects nurses’ demand to reopen pay talks

The DHSC said it will not reopen pay negotiations, but will continue to work collaboratively with unions to deliver a series of agreed reforms

Following the UK government’s new pay offer to NHS consultants, the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) wrote to the Health Secretary Victoria Atkins calling for fresh negotiations about nursing pay in England last week.

However, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has rejected their demand, stating that there is no basis to reopen talks as the pay deal was accepted by the NHS Staff Council.

In the previous pay deal, nurses were given a one-off payment between £1,655 and £3,789 for 2022/23, and a 5 per cent consolidated pay increase for the 2023/24 financial year.

Nursingnotes quoted a DHSC spokesperson as saying: “We hugely value the hard work of NHS nurses and that is why we provided a 5 per cent pay rise.

“We also provided two significant non-consolidated awards, which for nurses at the top of Band 5 was over £2,000, equivalent to an extra 6.1 per cent of their basic pay.

“This deal was accepted by the NHS Staff Council and we continue to work collaboratively, including with the RCN, to deliver a series of agreed reforms but we will not be reopening negotiations on pay.”

Unions and the government will submit evidence to the NHS Pay Review Body ahead of the next expected agenda for change pay review in Spring 2024.

RCN General Secretary and Chief Executive Pat Cullen wrote a strongly worded letter to the newly appointed Health Secretary expressing her frustration and “extreme disappointment” that the government has been unwilling to engage in further negotiations about nursing pay, despite the Union remaining in formal dispute regarding this year’s pay deal.

The union argued that the 5 per cent pay award for NHS nursing staff in England is inadequate to keep up with the inflation, and has been “consistently eclipsed” by the pay awards for other public sector workers.

“Nursing is one of the most diverse and female-dominated professions within the public sector, and the injustice of nursing pay is also a gender issue,” Pat said.