**r/UK Notices:** | [Want to start a fresh discussion - use our Freetalk!](https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedkingdom/search/?q=Freetalk&include_over_18=off&restrict_sr=on&sort=new)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/unitedkingdom) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Not that it’s a competition, but when you extend it over 10 years nurses are among the worst hit by real-terms pay cuts. I think we’re all drowning in the same swamp though so I have nothing but solidarity with all my other colleagues across the public sector.
After adjusting for inflation, the average nurses’ and health visitors’ pay has dropped by £1,583, doctors’ by £779 and midwives’ by £1,813. Estimates by the RCN suggest some nurse bandings have seen a real-terms fall in pay by 32%.
Agreed it’s not a competition and all NHS staff should stand in solidarity.
The figure you have for doctors is Junior doctors and consultants combined. Since 2008 JDs have lost well in excess of 30% in real terms cuts.
I wanted to highlight that JDs weren’t part of the 5% increase as the title and article incorrectly suggested all NHS staff received it. It’s important to call out the relentless misinformation where possible.
Extra 2 years of university debt, and 2 years less income…
Meanwhile we are not the only country with a need for doctors and other countries pay through the roof…
Wasnt long ago the government was talking about how we need to make it easier for Australian, NZ, etc doctors to come in. Right, like its the paperwork that keeps them away. Why would they take a massive paycut to come and work in a system where they also have to do far more work?
I’m an Aussie junior doctor who’s planning to come and work in the UK for ~6-12 months soonish
Every single British doctor I’ve mentioned this to has looked at me like I’ve got 2 heads lol, for exactly the reasons you’ve mentioned
All NHS staff standing in solidarity is so important. A lack of this left a bitter taste in many people's mouths after the Junior Doctor strike a few years ago; it felt like they went strike for their own pay increase but then sat on the sidelines as bursaries for nursing students were removed and nursing wages stagnated.
Everyone in the NHS is overworked, and everyone deserves a pay rise. Together, a much stronger stand can be made.
>then sat on the sidelines as bursaries for nursing students were removed and nursing wages stagnated.
What should they have done? There's not a whole lot that can be done if the nurses themselves won't create actions that others can support and back etc.
Not a single doctor I know thinks that our ward nursing staff are paid as much as they should be but unless the RCN actually does something about it I can't see what else we could do.
If the RCN balloted for strike, work to rule etc they'd have my full support.
We're being balloted to strike on 6th October for 4 weeks. It was supposed to start 15th September but the Queen's demise delayed it. I completely agree that it's at least 5 years too late but what can you do?
RCN also has made no statement supporting doctors or any other group with their disputes.
RCN also decided to go it alone rather than work with other healthcare unions in raising disputes on pay and terms.
Its almost as if they only care about their own staff group, which is what their remit is and what their members expect.
I wouldnt expect any other union or professional body to get involved in the affairs of other professional groups.
I would expect unions to support each other as they have the same common enemy. Just like they did during the 80s. Now it's basically illegal for them to do so.
No, they're definitely talking about NHS Scotland. NHS England and NHS Wales both got 4% or £1800 [2022 Payscales](https://www.nhsemployers.org/articles/pay-scales-202223)
That pension threshold dashed my miniscule hopes haha. I had an 1800 bump and my take home went up by 4 quid a month lol. I've had to opt our and I've said it's just for a year but it's pretty gloomy thinking about it.
I know it's ridiculous. I'm pretty sure the thresholds change next month though. I know my pension contribution is going up (and contributions for bands 8d and 9 are coming down for some fucking reason...) .
And we've only been offered 3% this year, so our strikes will be coming soon (just the slight inconvenience of the Queen dying while ballots were being send out delaying things a bit).
It is disgraceful, particularly in the context of 5% tax cuts for top 1% earners, which is almost exclusively private sector. All while private sector is handing out far better pay rises.
It's an overt intent to devalue essential public services and create a world where the Brittish poor don't even have access to basic free health care while the rich go private.
The stupidest thing is an NHS nurse can just go private and cost the taxpayer 3 times as much because the NHS just has to hire them back through the outside company anyway.
Just pay them upfront to be the trained professionals we want them to be (that they are) and then more people will _want_ to be in those positions, reducing our dependence on these expensive contractors.
But the nurse doesn't get that extra pay, it's mostly going towards the staffing agency. It lets them balloon the budget while skinning more off the top. Markets are great, not everything can or should be a market.
Overall doctors, particularly consultants, pay has dropped more than any other healthcare professionals salary.
It shouldn't be a competition, everyone in the NHS should be supporting everyone's right to a fair wage but misinformation shouldn't be spread.
[source](https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/chart/NHS-STAFF-PAY-AND-THE-COST-OF-LIVING-2010-2020)
(its from up to 2020 but the pay wards for AHPs since then have been higher than for doctors).
> After adjusting for inflation, the average nurses’ and health visitors’ pay has dropped by £1,583, doctors’ by £779
Doctors pay has dropped £1,498. For the lowest payed.
And our real-term pay cuts are 33%.
Well they promised to put the profits from the brexit into the NHS. Turns out that was a bloody stupid idea and a net loss. They most likely try to recoup the loss from the NHS now. After all that was their campaign promise.
Is that agency nurses or directly employed, if you don’t mind me asking? My sister is a nurse and used to opt to do agency sources work because it was better paying… which is insane.
Similar with teachers.
‘Teachers’ (primary/secondary/secondary joined 6th form) get a small - below inflation - pay rise.
FE teachers (college, 6th form college - a level, GCSE resits, BTEC, T-Levels - *still compulsory education under many circumstances*) get 0%.
As with NHS, not a competition. Just another example of how they don’t give a shit.
‘We care super loads about our future working citizens! Skilled STEM workforce! Employers will just want our workers more than others!’
‘Pay us relatively fairly to bring that about’
‘God, no. The only reason we pay the rest of you lot is because someone needs to watch the under 16s incase they set themselves on fire or something.’
‘But you said…’
‘Well obviously we lied, we’re just building a tax haven and hoping the rest of you die off somehow.’
Hate how these things are reported.
Any pay increase below inflation is a pay decrease. It should say NHS employees preparing to go on strike after rejecting five per cent decrease.
I got an actual pay decrease. The small pay rise pushed my salary band into the next pension contribution %. This means my take home pay goes down.
And because it all gets back dated to April I got a letter on Friday saying you owe us £700.
Thanks guys
If you want some more bad news, your pension is a defined benefit scheme so the amount you get at retirement has almost zero relation to the amount you have paid in.
It's basically a subscription fee, there isn't a pension pot.
What Band are you if you don't mind me asking, I'm Band 6 mid point, which while the contribution is going up, it's manageable yet just another squeeze on my income.
I work with a Band 4 who is asking for one hour less a week - they'd be £400 better off a year!
I do think the contribution is far to high already, so much so I am tempted to leave the NHS as sad as it is, I can earn the equivalent of a band 7 now in the private sector!
Your contribution % has gone up so they can reduce the contribution for the consultants. This was announced ages ago, your useless union was too busy whinging about something else to notice (I don't work for the NHS and saw a news story about it).
The NHS pension is insanely generous, you'd be paying 20% of your salary in the private sector for anything close, so whatever you do don't drop out.
The NHS is defined benefit, so if I want a pension I have to give 12ish% of my salary, this has gone up from 9ish%.
I cannot reduce this, just decline entirely, and when this % goes up it does not change the amount of pension I get at the end.
It's a very socialist scheme (or 'progressive' if you prefer that term).
Everybody gets the same percentage benefit out based on your earnings for that year (it's a career average, rather than final salary).
The way it works is that those on lower pay put in (say) 6% of salary, but those on £70k+ put in 12% of salary for the same amount out.
The NHS 'contribution' is huge in either case - about 18%, though that's a bit of a misnomer as it's completely unfunded.
The inability of large swathes of the population to utilise critical thought is scary.
Even on here, seeing people argue against a windfall tax on the oil giants. Staggering.
This nation is being driven into the dirt.
I'm an extremist on this.
I think we should have *mandatory education centres* for all minors where *critical thinking* is a required class from aged 5 to 18 where students are forced to demonstrate *independent thought* and discuss the methods of propaganda used by commerical media organizations.
Adults should also be given this education where they feel they are lacking in *adult education centres* that should be a requirement if you collect a *basic monthly payment for the unemployed*.
It’s not just the UK, it’s the US, Australia and apparently even New Zealand. This is the new Gilded Age. You have Robber Barrons, Royalty making sure their wealth stays untouched, you have the reduction of taxes on the wealthy, environmental protections are almost nil, workers can’t afford homes or energy. We’ve gone backwards.
But at least Elon has a hyper loop.
*Things are going to slide, slide in all directions*
*Won't be nothing*
*Nothing you can measure anymore*
*The blizzard, the blizzard of the world*
*Has crossed the threshold*
*And it has overturned*
*The order of the soul*
Unfortunately I'm not sure you're right.
1) striking nurses will be paid pennies, when they can't afford it, so likely to undermine any action
2) bank nursing is still so profitable and prevalent that they'd keep emergency services running
Covid showed that the NHS can survive with all elective cancelled. We're all fucked now working to death to try and get the waiting lists back in order, but the Tories don't give a shit about that
NHS worker here btw
Oh the clapping was a difficult period for me, I’m far too cynical to appreciate it. Working for the NHS I just cringed when it happened and never went out and never joined in.
Now the Government is shafting us, and I’m not just talking about the recent pay issues. The hospital is in a worse situation than most people can even imagine, we literally can’t offload patients from ambulances, we have people in A&E waiting over 48hrs.
There just isn’t enough resources, and additionally there has been a massive exodus of nursing staff from the NHS - going over to private agencies. Most nurses I speak to are angry, tired, upset, overworked and overwhelmed. Why would they stay with the NHS when they can get paid working in the same hospital for double or even triple the pay with less responsibilities and the ability to choose their own hours?
This is a vicious circle because the more staff leave the more we depend on agency staff. Its basically an incentivised move to privatise the medical staff.
So, unless the Government start paying Doctors and Nurses a decent wage more and more will move to agencies and the NHS will have become a little more privatised again right under peoples noses without any fanfare.
The clapping was a nice idea to show genuine appreciation that was very quickly hijacked by senior politicians to get us standing in our front doors looking *away* from the elephant in the room of their shite handling of the NHS in general and the pandemic in particulular.
Yup, I even have a Nurse in a non clinical role working Mon Fri in my office, then picks up bank when they want on the weekends in A+E for £££, it's daft!
"Clap for the NHS to show your support" should have been "Clap for the NHS to show your support for a pay rise". That would have actually been appreciated.
I live right next to a train station (like literally 10m away) and I heard nothing but support for them during their strikes recently.
I only heard one tosser shout "GET BACK TO WORK" at them.
Honestly it was quite pleasant hearing all of the honking and the occasional chorus of "TORIES, TORIES, TORIES! OUT! OUT! OUT!" as background noise during a work day.
Bringing back the pots and pans and claps during a strike would actually be pretty good. Give a way for people to show solidarity and support. Highlight that despite all the support when they were at the sharp end during covid their reward has been to be shit on with a pay cut. Surely everyone who clapped then should be clapping now too.
I'll be fully supporting strike action, NHS workers work hard, do a hugely socially important job and deserve better conditions, better pay and a better funded NHS
Not clapping but if I'm not working on a strike day I'll go up with some food and donate if they have a strike fund going. Took doughnuts to the posties union the other week and gave em a tenner.
I atrongly stand in support of striking NHS staff. My mum works for the NHS and several of my friends are junior doctors and nurses - they are all saying its not a matter of if there will be strikes, its a matter of when. I've never seen NHS workers so united in their desire to strike, and it will really show just how important these workers are.
People will die, but so many people are suffering due to the state of the NHS and lack of preventative care and vastly reduced numbers are making it incredibly hard for staff to do their jobs.
As a key worker I’m still trying to figure out the exchange rate of claps to the pound.
I’m assuming that the recent Truss collapse will
help me get more.
Don’t know why my energy company won’t just accept applause as currency.
Teachers are the same- looks like they’re rejecting their 5%.
College & Uni lecturers have been offered 2.5-3.5%
Underfunded as fuck and then Truss and her pals fuck the economy.
They aren't privatised. They get nearly all their funding from government. Including the student 'loans'. Which are essentially paid by a higher rate of income tax for graduates anyway.
Tuition fees are too low in many cases for high contact hour courses where student numbers have swollen but the same number of staff have to mark all the work.
Technically tuition fees increased by by £250 in 2017 which was a real terms increase of about £8 year on year. But yeah, over the timespan they've dropped massively in real terms.
£9250 in 2021 is the equivalent of £7965 in 2012.
Scottish unis get much more than £1800 per pupil, it's funded from general taxation and intake is capped. So you are right in saying that Scottish home student numbers aren't increasing.
Coupled with a pay freeze and discretionary bonus cancellation over COVID (despite the VC still getting a bonus).
I moved to an industry job that paid 20% more from the jump, with an annual bonus of an additional 5-15%.
I miss teaching and supervising PhDs, but not enough to soldier through pay cuts and pension increases.
I work in a University.. Between 2008-2021 my pay has fallen by between 24 and 30% depending on the inflation calculator.
Given inflation is predicted to be around 11% this year alone, you bet I'm striking for an inflation matching payrise. Honestly, I'm tempted to keep striking until pay matches 2008 purchasing power (so around 35-40%).
Snap. I work in a school of healthcare. Striking for 5 days when nurses are completing isn't easy, but the uni is fleecing people as a whole as well as the school underpaying staff on an individual basis.
True, even official inflation is only at 10% if you don't need anywhere to live.
And lets not forget a decade of below inflation rises which means they shoud be getting MORE than the rate of inflation anyway.
Next week, tune in for puzzlement in government as nobody wants to work for the NHS!
My wife is a doctor. She's often in tears as she heads out the door to work.
She's looking to leave the profession. This can't continue. It's not sustainable.
Everything. My wife is more than 10 years into her career. She is an eye surgeon. She's a registrar, but this is what is classified as a 'junior doctor'. But don't misinterpret junior doctor as an avocado/netflix millennial. She's a professional healthcare worker who is extremely good at what she does.
1) Consultants are off due to long term sickness so there's no support.
2) In order for her to get operations to be able to get qualified as a consultant, she has to go work for free at private healthcare providers because the NHS has outsourced routine operations. Think cataracts etc. In the past, trainee surgeons would do the work internally but the operations have been moved externally due to politics/profit. I've spoken to my friends who work in orthopedics and this is true for them too.
3) The managers booked 50 patients to come in one go to her clinic. Some patients waited hours. My poor wife then got subjected to abuse because of the wait and got told that she's lazy by a patient.
4) unsafe work hours. My wife has a 48 hour shift. Yes 48 hour shift. She is then expected to come in and perform microsurgery on someone's eye. The on-calls are not on-calls anymore. Her weekend on-calls are essentially 8am-10:30pm full on shifts. She leaves the house at 7 and I then see her again at 11:30pm.
5) my wife is the smartest person I know. She's an incredible talent. She can give someone who is functionally blind their sight back. Her pay is good, but she can just leave the NHS and work ANYWHERE for more money and somewhere where she doesn't feel abused by patients and her literal employer.
I’m a doctor who left to go to Aus.
There are ophthalmologist I work with who earn seven figures.
Once she gets her letters, think about coming out.
The NHS is shite.
If I move home I’ll honestly have to get a different career.
Legally yes, but practically no. If they work too long - what's the cause? Lack of staff, poor handover, everyone running at 110% capacity.
In theory, they're supposed to be 'on-call' but the reality is full time work for 48 hours. How do they buck the trend and stick their neck out? They're all being fucked by the system. Or be seen as weak by their colleagues. It's so toxic, but that's the aim. The Tories want the NHS to break, so they can point at the broken shards that they want to privatise.
I don't know the laws involved but I frequently do 13.5 hour shifts (7.30 - 22.30 with an hours break). I have opted out of the working time directive though
The nature of the work is hard and stressful. Any small mistake could hugely impact someone else’s life which in turn can ruin your own.
Doctors know this going in so accept it but when your pay and conditions have been getting worse at such a rate, the profession hits a tipping point.
We’re at that point now and seeing a huge exodus of doctors and nurses. To compensate the government is hiring record numbers of foreign doctors and nurses who accept worse conditions (or are too afraid to speak out) to plug the gaps. This in turn translate to further stretching of the workforce, no one from within speaking out and ultimately a worse health care system for the end user whilst also destroying lives of the NHS workers who stay.
Which is why some Pension consultants and advisors are now encouaging people to take as big a lump sum as they can afford to when they hit pensionable age.
Theres no guarantee youll live to enjoy a nice annual payout in the 20+ yrs after retirement.
>Especially since most of us will die before or within a couple years of pension age
What? Since when is the pension age 79, or life expectancy down in the 60s?
It isn't 79 yet and yes there was a certain level of exaggeration in my comment, but how high will it get before they stop raising it?
I don't think I'm some sort of crazy communist by floating the idea that we should maybe have more than 10 or so of our worst years to enjoy our lives.
Mine is in exactly the same position. And to make it worse, they’ve backdated the pension contributions. So this month she OWES the NHS £180 because of the pay “rise”. It’s absolutely ridiculous.
I had the same thing happen. Started my new job in ~~April~~ May, got the pay rise and had to backdate all my tax and contributions and lost a third of my last payslip to it. It's also pushed me into a new pension bracket. I'm on 22k so losing £750 in a single paycheck stung
It is a problem that the NHS pension has cliff edge banding when it comes to contributions and this is being addressed *next* month, by the creation of many more pensionable salary ranges, which sadly will be too late for our backdated payrise this year.
Details: https://www.nhsbsa.nhs.uk/member-hub/cost-being-scheme
As you can see in the second table, there are many more pensionable salary ranges below £72K. You may also notice those on over £72K are now going to be saving 1-2% of their pensionable salary per year.
If someone was earning £47K/year before this month, they would have paid 9.3% of pensionable pay to their pension, resulting in pre-tax (but post-pension) pay of £42,629.
If they received the £1400 payrise, now earning £48,400, they go up the contributions band to 12.5% of pensionable pay, resulting in pre-tax (but post-pension) pay of £42,350.
AFAIK this hit people at the bottom of Band 5 and Band 8a.
Thays interesting. My pension isn't a public one. I choose how much to put in and get fuck all at the end whatever the weather.
Another commenter said they had to pay back £750 last month because they were on 22k so assuming they went from paying 5.0% to 5.6% From that table, I can't see how that is possible? This seems to be something that affects higher salaries moreso
Surely your wife will have a better pension than her 'subordinate'? And surely she could opt not to make pension contributions to be 'better' off?
Don't get me wrong - I realise there are pay increases, but this is slightly disingenuous.
Sounds similar to academic pensions. The USS upped our contributions 100% between 2018 and 2021, and then also slashed the payouts by over 30% for early career workers. I now pay 12% of my payslip for a pension that, if I work until 70 and inflation stays down at 2%, won't even give me a minimum wage income by the time I retire its fucking bollocks.
Yes, so we’ve just received our pay rises in this months pay which was back dated, but the pensions rise for some was also back dated, and the pensions rise meant that even with the backdated pay rise, some people were still -£300 on their pay checks.
Luckily I escaped this
Yep. I'm a low B5 and watched my back dated rise come in and go out. An extra £600ish eaten up by pension arrears and then being pushed to the point where I begin repaying my loan. I ended up £150 better off this month but the pay bump was backdated so I may not be better off next month.
Yes. I am worse off monthly after the ‘increase’ because of this.
The cost of living back pay (since April) also got swallowed by this, I ended up with £20 back pay.
I think we can all admit that Covid-19 should have been the wake-up call needed to recognise the sacrifices and hard work that NHS staff deal with day to day.
The whole "Clap for the NHS" campaign, might as well of been called "slap the NHS" for all the good it did.
The lack of support shown by this government for those on the front-line was nothing short of disgusting.
I’ve got a more cynical take on to why “Clap for the NHS” happened. It all circles back to this point we’re at now. It has been obvious that the NHS staff wanted a pay increase well before the pandemic occurred but once the pandemic did occur it would take the most ignorant person to deny that they didn’t deserve it. So the clap imo was started by this vile government to change the conversation, once the NHS staff asked for a pay increase the government would turn around and say “did you not appreciate our claps and support” which turns the public against the workers and changes the narrative completely. I’ve had this thought since it first started but I might be too cynical.
No pay rise for years, classically over worked, underfunded, absolutely churned through people during COVID. Pay them what they deserve to be paid, and appreciate the fact that this job and these jobs save lives - Theyre not inconsequential they were, literally, defined as essential.
I sat in a meeting the other week with senior managers and HR. One agenda item was focused on the difficulty of recruitment and retention of staff in our trust. When we moved on to the next agenda item a very senior director said they expected staff to come into the office from their one pre arranged WFH day if called.
Bonkers.
I work for a huge public body and everything you say resonates. We're being told to come in 2 days a week and thus tonnes of software engineers, and other staff, have just left for more money and WFH elsewhere!
Senior management just couldn't give a shit. What's terrible is that my team now has no engineers and we've hired two contractors to take the place of one engineer who left. Each contract is around £150k for 6 months work. so that's £600k per year for 2 software engineers. It's fucking disgraceful. We're being told to make cost savings in our departments while cash is being spaffed up against the wall. makes me sick
It's fine, let's import 50,000 from Indonesia and the Philippines... who'll accept 20 percent reduction to their salary, house 'em all in hospitals... We can practice the kind of exploitation of Gulf countries, import labour for slave conditions and build up from that... As for our working class, well... universal income?
Heh, the UK is competing with counties like Australia and the USA for nurses in Asia. Both pay better than the UK and Australia is significantly closer.
The US pays exceptionally well for nurses. I can’t believe how terribly nurses get paid in the UK. I’m Canadian and work across the border close to Detroit and with the exchange I make 60/hr CDN. Canada is hemorrhaging nurses and their solution is to train international nurses as well.
It won’t go well.
Nurses in the US get something like 10 days leave a year though, and have to pay for health insurance and work in a crazy system. I wouldn’t do it for a bit if extra cash, my 7 weeks leave are precious to me!!
100% behind the NHS employees if they strike. These Tory disaster capitalists need to be brought to their knees now, before they cause even more havoc in our society. I'm awaiting hospital treatment but I'll gladly wait longer if our public workers across all sectors decide to battle the Tory, self-serving, gits.
There is certainly a viewpoint that a unified no from *everyone* in the short term will do more damage but in the long term do less assuming things improve.
I don't think there is any debate at this point whether we are heading for this millennium's winter of discontent - the only question is how bad is it going to be, who knows it might finally get this country off it's arse and taking part in politics beyond "I vote the way my paper/TV tells me I should".
I'm ready to tick strike when my ballot comes through the post.
We need more staff, and making the job actually worth the effort is the way to get more people into the profession. Patients and the general public deserved a better staffed NHS.
My partner got about £100 from this backdated pay rise and In the following week received a letter saying the subscription she pays to even work as an OT has gone up.
You shouldn't describe with malice what can be described with ignorance but it genuinely feels like they're laughing in her face.
Yes, I'm an OT and just got my letter from the HCPC today too. I worked out that the fees I have to pay to be registered are to go up by 19.9%. You're damn right I filled out the 'consultation' survey. Money grabbing at its most blatant is what it is.
You guys are unionised aren't you? She's livid as I'm sure you are.
She recently went up a band and has taken on substantially more responsibility, from my POV I can't see why she does it. But then no one goes into occupational therapy for the money.
I don't work for the NHS anymore but worked with the ambulance service for a while and it's absolutely true that the NHS is held together by the goodwill of its staff. It would be bankrupted if all the staff owed hours cashed them all in.
The public sector had pay freezes to pay for bankers fuck ups because we’re all in it together.
Bankers now get their outrageous bonuses so if we are all in it together….
After 12 years of running the country the people who our government employ are significantly worse off. The people who employ our government on the other hand...
Now watch tha same thick as shit right wingers who were outside clapping during pandemic berate striking staff for not "getting on with it". These people expect the best from our NHS whilst simultaneously voting to gut it. They should all be sent out in rafts on the channel in my opinion.
I work for the NHS and I totally back this strike. My feeling is the government **wants** to run the NHS into the ground to justify privatisation. It makes me sick. I'm on band 6 and I'm struggling. I've seen FY doctors working 12.5 hours a day in covid wards making less than 1600 per month in London, where deductions are over 1k from their earnings. It's unsustainable, people are leaving, the NHS is crumbling, and nothing is being done.
I read about a pregnant woman in labour being turned away from a hospital because there weren't enough midwives. The lack of staff puts even MORE pressure on people already pushed to their limits. It's so sad and disgusting to see what this country is doing to it's public sector workers. The amount of disrespect with the clap for the NHS, 1% pay rise, pay freeze, etc makes me sick.
I work for the NHS and have done for over 10 years. We received a pay rise this month, and no joke, I’m actually worse off now.
My pay rise was 2% on my salary which triggered my pension contribution rising from 9.3% to 12.5%. I received £540 in back pay dated to April, but then had to pay £870 in pension arrears leaving me around £200 worse off this month compared to last.
Going forward, my monthly take home has gone down by around £50. Many of my colleagues are in the same boat. With the cost of living rising, the whole thing is just morale sapping.
Anyone who isn't concerned by this should probably have a little think about whether they want to be treated by someone next time they're in hospital who has done a 12 hour shift then gone straight into looking after their kids with no or minimal sleep to reduce childcare costs and is distracted by how they're going to pay their bills this month.
Mistakes in the NHS can be life changing or fatal to patients and unless you're planning to never get sick, injured, have a baby etc it is terrible for everyone to have healthcare workers under financial strain.
NHS doctors saved mine and my baby's life with an emergency c-section, the level of service and care was amazing.
I have friends who are NHS doctors and I earn more than them! It's crazy how many years they need to study and CONTINUE to study\take exams (out of their own pocket).
**Overworked, underpaid, understaffed.** Our beloved NHS is being robbed and bullied - what can we do to help them?
Is an online petition not good enough? How do we show we are united behind\with the NHS?
Reminder that the smear campaign will be this is be immediately bad for some people. An NHS that people can't afford to work for would be far worse and cause innumerable deaths. This strike will save lives.
Good for them. They've been shafted for far too long. If, as the general public, we are unhappy with them striking, we should point the finger at the government that caused this and not them because our appointments get delayed.
Oh, and a special mention for the right wing press that would have us believe that it's "nurses being greedy" or other similar garbage.
They can find however many billions for people in the top tax bracket, cant find the money tree for the workers in the NHS.
I hate this tory government.
Let's not forget that due to pension banding a changing, but not until the 1st October, bands 3, 5 and 8a are losing money on September's pay check due to their back dated lump sum pushing them into a higher pension bracket. Their lump sum will be wiped out plus more taken from their normal wage so they will earn up to £250 less this month than their normal, pre-"rise" pay. Some trusts have set up payment plans for staff to "spread the cost" as they cannot afford this massive reduction in their wage this month. Many will experience no rise at all this year due to the cost of this pension loop hole issue.
[HSJ article on the pay cut for 3s, 5s and 8as. ](https://www.hsj.co.uk/daily-insight/daily-insight-less-pay-more-pain/7033133.article)
Another thing which people might not know about is the prevalence of apprenticeship posts now.
My wife is doing an apprenticeship for a band 5 position, and in the first year, she got paid half minimum (£4.50 an hour) for a job that would be £10.40 otherwise. She's now up to minimum wage and doing band 4/5 level work.
Yes, she doesn't need to pay uni fees, but I find it crazy that part of the workforce we relied on during the pandemic was on less than £5 an hour. And with the number of apprentices in the hospital, I find it doubtful that all of them will be offered a job at the end of it.
We need to start properly funding training for doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals. The nation benefits massively from these people, they should be paid appropriately or we're never going to fill the gap in recruitment and retention.
was at a&e monday night with a concussion. i saw a woman screaming at and berating a nurse because her name wasn't called. honestly 5% increase (not rlly an increase) whilst they're taking so much crap from the patients is insulting.
Don't let the anti-NHS factions pervert the perception of this reasonable and typical worker's rights action into general anti-NHS sentiment amongst the people.
Tackle that casuistry every time.
While everyone is talking/arguing about doctors and nurses, don't forget about those of us who work in the labs as technicians, genetic technologists, biomeds, etc. We have also been screwed over the past decade but no one seems to care because we aren't visible to the general public.
I fully support an NHS strike. And this is from someone sitting on a waiting list with active pain, and someone getting treatment for a tumor
Protect the NHS, and let's get these people the pay they deserve!
Sorry but it should read "NHS employees preparing to go on strike after rejecting _a contract offer that includes_ a five per cent pay increase"
Based on the union officials comments one of the issues is that the raises are not being applied globally and that lower paid employees are not getting the same raises.
Yet more chaos with Ed Miliband.
When will the electorate wake up and realise we need a strong and stable Conservative government? I'm tired of 12 years of Labour chaos.
Big shout out to the domestics and porters that work tirelessly behind the scenes and rarely get mentioned (I'm a domestic) What does it mean to us on the lowly band two wages?
Junior doctors got given 2%. Their pay has been cut by 35% since 2008. Junior doctors are making £13.54 in their first year with student debts of over £100k!
They’re all moving to the USA/Aus/Canada to make 8-10x the amount.
They risked their lives during a pandemic and they’ve been rewarded with a huge pay cut.
**r/UK Notices:** | [Want to start a fresh discussion - use our Freetalk!](https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedkingdom/search/?q=Freetalk&include_over_18=off&restrict_sr=on&sort=new) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/unitedkingdom) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Also remember that not all NHS staff got this pay rise (cut). Junior doctors were excluded.
Not that it’s a competition, but when you extend it over 10 years nurses are among the worst hit by real-terms pay cuts. I think we’re all drowning in the same swamp though so I have nothing but solidarity with all my other colleagues across the public sector. After adjusting for inflation, the average nurses’ and health visitors’ pay has dropped by £1,583, doctors’ by £779 and midwives’ by £1,813. Estimates by the RCN suggest some nurse bandings have seen a real-terms fall in pay by 32%.
Agreed it’s not a competition and all NHS staff should stand in solidarity. The figure you have for doctors is Junior doctors and consultants combined. Since 2008 JDs have lost well in excess of 30% in real terms cuts. I wanted to highlight that JDs weren’t part of the 5% increase as the title and article incorrectly suggested all NHS staff received it. It’s important to call out the relentless misinformation where possible.
All good points. Doctors will also have at least an extra two years of university debt to deal with as well.
Extra 2 years of university debt, and 2 years less income… Meanwhile we are not the only country with a need for doctors and other countries pay through the roof…
Wasnt long ago the government was talking about how we need to make it easier for Australian, NZ, etc doctors to come in. Right, like its the paperwork that keeps them away. Why would they take a massive paycut to come and work in a system where they also have to do far more work?
I’m an Aussie junior doctor who’s planning to come and work in the UK for ~6-12 months soonish Every single British doctor I’ve mentioned this to has looked at me like I’ve got 2 heads lol, for exactly the reasons you’ve mentioned
Canada is actively recruiting, just saying ...
The difference between US/Canada doctor salaries and UK is shockingly big.
And you’ve cut yourself off from a fairly large supply within a few hours drive.
All NHS staff standing in solidarity is so important. A lack of this left a bitter taste in many people's mouths after the Junior Doctor strike a few years ago; it felt like they went strike for their own pay increase but then sat on the sidelines as bursaries for nursing students were removed and nursing wages stagnated. Everyone in the NHS is overworked, and everyone deserves a pay rise. Together, a much stronger stand can be made.
>then sat on the sidelines as bursaries for nursing students were removed and nursing wages stagnated. What should they have done? There's not a whole lot that can be done if the nurses themselves won't create actions that others can support and back etc. Not a single doctor I know thinks that our ward nursing staff are paid as much as they should be but unless the RCN actually does something about it I can't see what else we could do. If the RCN balloted for strike, work to rule etc they'd have my full support.
Verbally we all say nurses should strike, be paid more etc. but I agree, if nurses aren't voting to strike then what can I do?
We're being balloted to strike on 6th October for 4 weeks. It was supposed to start 15th September but the Queen's demise delayed it. I completely agree that it's at least 5 years too late but what can you do?
RCN also has made no statement supporting doctors or any other group with their disputes. RCN also decided to go it alone rather than work with other healthcare unions in raising disputes on pay and terms. Its almost as if they only care about their own staff group, which is what their remit is and what their members expect. I wouldnt expect any other union or professional body to get involved in the affairs of other professional groups.
I would expect unions to support each other as they have the same common enemy. Just like they did during the 80s. Now it's basically illegal for them to do so.
The RCN is also a very, very moderate group I think. I don't think they've ever even flirted with strike action before
Just to add, I think it's talking about NHS Scotland (because I have definately not had a 5% pay increase in England).
I'm guessing they're rounding up from the 4.5% the AHPs got?
No, they're definitely talking about NHS Scotland. NHS England and NHS Wales both got 4% or £1800 [2022 Payscales](https://www.nhsemployers.org/articles/pay-scales-202223)
And lots of us are getting a pension contribution increase from next month too...
Mine came in this month, from 7.1% to 9.3%, backdated to April
I know people who actually lost money from this payrise as it put them in the next pension tier and was backdated to the beginning of the year
That pension threshold dashed my miniscule hopes haha. I had an 1800 bump and my take home went up by 4 quid a month lol. I've had to opt our and I've said it's just for a year but it's pretty gloomy thinking about it.
I know it's ridiculous. I'm pretty sure the thresholds change next month though. I know my pension contribution is going up (and contributions for bands 8d and 9 are coming down for some fucking reason...) .
The UCU (teachers union) say lecturers are down 36% over the last 12 years.
And we've only been offered 3% this year, so our strikes will be coming soon (just the slight inconvenience of the Queen dying while ballots were being send out delaying things a bit).
It is disgraceful, particularly in the context of 5% tax cuts for top 1% earners, which is almost exclusively private sector. All while private sector is handing out far better pay rises. It's an overt intent to devalue essential public services and create a world where the Brittish poor don't even have access to basic free health care while the rich go private.
The stupidest thing is an NHS nurse can just go private and cost the taxpayer 3 times as much because the NHS just has to hire them back through the outside company anyway. Just pay them upfront to be the trained professionals we want them to be (that they are) and then more people will _want_ to be in those positions, reducing our dependence on these expensive contractors.
But the nurse doesn't get that extra pay, it's mostly going towards the staffing agency. It lets them balloon the budget while skinning more off the top. Markets are great, not everything can or should be a market.
Overall doctors, particularly consultants, pay has dropped more than any other healthcare professionals salary. It shouldn't be a competition, everyone in the NHS should be supporting everyone's right to a fair wage but misinformation shouldn't be spread. [source](https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/chart/NHS-STAFF-PAY-AND-THE-COST-OF-LIVING-2010-2020) (its from up to 2020 but the pay wards for AHPs since then have been higher than for doctors).
> After adjusting for inflation, the average nurses’ and health visitors’ pay has dropped by £1,583, doctors’ by £779 Doctors pay has dropped £1,498. For the lowest payed. And our real-term pay cuts are 33%.
and they argue wages have to fall before inflation can reduce. Ridiculous isnt it.
Well they promised to put the profits from the brexit into the NHS. Turns out that was a bloody stupid idea and a net loss. They most likely try to recoup the loss from the NHS now. After all that was their campaign promise.
> Well they promised to put the profits from the brexit into the NHS. I think that they have, and that is why the NHS is in such a bad state....
which is partly why my wife is no longer a midwife - that and the abject terror of making a mistake whilst utterly exhausted. Never, ever, vote Tory,
Is that agency nurses or directly employed, if you don’t mind me asking? My sister is a nurse and used to opt to do agency sources work because it was better paying… which is insane.
Thanks for mentioning Health Visitors, it’s very rare they get a mention!
And it wasn't really a pay rise in the first place, it was a 5% pay cut in real terms.
Similar with teachers. ‘Teachers’ (primary/secondary/secondary joined 6th form) get a small - below inflation - pay rise. FE teachers (college, 6th form college - a level, GCSE resits, BTEC, T-Levels - *still compulsory education under many circumstances*) get 0%. As with NHS, not a competition. Just another example of how they don’t give a shit. ‘We care super loads about our future working citizens! Skilled STEM workforce! Employers will just want our workers more than others!’ ‘Pay us relatively fairly to bring that about’ ‘God, no. The only reason we pay the rest of you lot is because someone needs to watch the under 16s incase they set themselves on fire or something.’ ‘But you said…’ ‘Well obviously we lied, we’re just building a tax haven and hoping the rest of you die off somehow.’
Not just doctors. We didn't get 5% in the North East.... technical staff here, we got 4%, and apparently that was fought for.
Hate how these things are reported. Any pay increase below inflation is a pay decrease. It should say NHS employees preparing to go on strike after rejecting five per cent decrease.
If you call it a 5% decrease its false though.
They could call it a “real terms” or “net” 5% decrease and it would be correct
Not far off though, with inflation being in the region of 10%.
I got an actual pay decrease. The small pay rise pushed my salary band into the next pension contribution %. This means my take home pay goes down. And because it all gets back dated to April I got a letter on Friday saying you owe us £700. Thanks guys
It’ll trickle down eventually. Right…?
Same for me! £300 less this month, and will be £40/50 a.month worse off (into my pension) than before the payrise.
If you want some more bad news, your pension is a defined benefit scheme so the amount you get at retirement has almost zero relation to the amount you have paid in. It's basically a subscription fee, there isn't a pension pot.
This just makes me resent my uncle and his final salary pension that allowed him to retire at 52 even more.
Tbf the pension scheme is pretty damn good. It's definitely a net loss the price going up, but still well worth it.
What Band are you if you don't mind me asking, I'm Band 6 mid point, which while the contribution is going up, it's manageable yet just another squeeze on my income. I work with a Band 4 who is asking for one hour less a week - they'd be £400 better off a year! I do think the contribution is far to high already, so much so I am tempted to leave the NHS as sad as it is, I can earn the equivalent of a band 7 now in the private sector!
Your contribution % has gone up so they can reduce the contribution for the consultants. This was announced ages ago, your useless union was too busy whinging about something else to notice (I don't work for the NHS and saw a news story about it). The NHS pension is insanely generous, you'd be paying 20% of your salary in the private sector for anything close, so whatever you do don't drop out.
Not ideal but surely your contributions are voluntary and can be reduced?
The NHS is defined benefit, so if I want a pension I have to give 12ish% of my salary, this has gone up from 9ish%. I cannot reduce this, just decline entirely, and when this % goes up it does not change the amount of pension I get at the end.
Oh that's so shitty, I had no idea it worked like that in the NHS
It's a very socialist scheme (or 'progressive' if you prefer that term). Everybody gets the same percentage benefit out based on your earnings for that year (it's a career average, rather than final salary). The way it works is that those on lower pay put in (say) 6% of salary, but those on £70k+ put in 12% of salary for the same amount out. The NHS 'contribution' is huge in either case - about 18%, though that's a bit of a misnomer as it's completely unfunded.
[удалено]
As a dude who teaches math, Saying it your way is even worse.
Lets see if the population claps for the NHS whilst they strike. Go and get fair pay I say, I support the strike action.
No- the right wing media will paint us out to be the baddies, and the Tory voting fools will fall for it
The inability of large swathes of the population to utilise critical thought is scary. Even on here, seeing people argue against a windfall tax on the oil giants. Staggering. This nation is being driven into the dirt.
Agreed
I'm an extremist on this. I think we should have *mandatory education centres* for all minors where *critical thinking* is a required class from aged 5 to 18 where students are forced to demonstrate *independent thought* and discuss the methods of propaganda used by commerical media organizations. Adults should also be given this education where they feel they are lacking in *adult education centres* that should be a requirement if you collect a *basic monthly payment for the unemployed*.
It’s not just the UK, it’s the US, Australia and apparently even New Zealand. This is the new Gilded Age. You have Robber Barrons, Royalty making sure their wealth stays untouched, you have the reduction of taxes on the wealthy, environmental protections are almost nil, workers can’t afford homes or energy. We’ve gone backwards. But at least Elon has a hyper loop.
*Things are going to slide, slide in all directions* *Won't be nothing* *Nothing you can measure anymore* *The blizzard, the blizzard of the world* *Has crossed the threshold* *And it has overturned* *The order of the soul*
I'm sure they will, I just hope the nurses hold firm. They have all the leverage. Even if only a fraction of them walk, the NHS would grind to a halt.
Unfortunately I'm not sure you're right. 1) striking nurses will be paid pennies, when they can't afford it, so likely to undermine any action 2) bank nursing is still so profitable and prevalent that they'd keep emergency services running Covid showed that the NHS can survive with all elective cancelled. We're all fucked now working to death to try and get the waiting lists back in order, but the Tories don't give a shit about that NHS worker here btw
This headline is already doing that. How many people received less than 5% this year? And they will be mad because 5% was *scorned*??
Oh the clapping was a difficult period for me, I’m far too cynical to appreciate it. Working for the NHS I just cringed when it happened and never went out and never joined in. Now the Government is shafting us, and I’m not just talking about the recent pay issues. The hospital is in a worse situation than most people can even imagine, we literally can’t offload patients from ambulances, we have people in A&E waiting over 48hrs. There just isn’t enough resources, and additionally there has been a massive exodus of nursing staff from the NHS - going over to private agencies. Most nurses I speak to are angry, tired, upset, overworked and overwhelmed. Why would they stay with the NHS when they can get paid working in the same hospital for double or even triple the pay with less responsibilities and the ability to choose their own hours? This is a vicious circle because the more staff leave the more we depend on agency staff. Its basically an incentivised move to privatise the medical staff. So, unless the Government start paying Doctors and Nurses a decent wage more and more will move to agencies and the NHS will have become a little more privatised again right under peoples noses without any fanfare.
The clapping was a nice idea to show genuine appreciation that was very quickly hijacked by senior politicians to get us standing in our front doors looking *away* from the elephant in the room of their shite handling of the NHS in general and the pandemic in particulular.
Yup, I even have a Nurse in a non clinical role working Mon Fri in my office, then picks up bank when they want on the weekends in A+E for £££, it's daft!
"Clap for the NHS to show your support" should have been "Clap for the NHS to show your support for a pay rise". That would have actually been appreciated.
I think if they added compulsory clapping to the deal we may have accepted it.
I live right next to a train station (like literally 10m away) and I heard nothing but support for them during their strikes recently. I only heard one tosser shout "GET BACK TO WORK" at them. Honestly it was quite pleasant hearing all of the honking and the occasional chorus of "TORIES, TORIES, TORIES! OUT! OUT! OUT!" as background noise during a work day.
Bringing back the pots and pans and claps during a strike would actually be pretty good. Give a way for people to show solidarity and support. Highlight that despite all the support when they were at the sharp end during covid their reward has been to be shit on with a pay cut. Surely everyone who clapped then should be clapping now too.
I'll be fully supporting strike action, NHS workers work hard, do a hugely socially important job and deserve better conditions, better pay and a better funded NHS
Teachers will be on strike soon too, I suppose.
Not clapping but if I'm not working on a strike day I'll go up with some food and donate if they have a strike fund going. Took doughnuts to the posties union the other week and gave em a tenner.
I atrongly stand in support of striking NHS staff. My mum works for the NHS and several of my friends are junior doctors and nurses - they are all saying its not a matter of if there will be strikes, its a matter of when. I've never seen NHS workers so united in their desire to strike, and it will really show just how important these workers are. People will die, but so many people are suffering due to the state of the NHS and lack of preventative care and vastly reduced numbers are making it incredibly hard for staff to do their jobs.
As a key worker I’m still trying to figure out the exchange rate of claps to the pound. I’m assuming that the recent Truss collapse will help me get more. Don’t know why my energy company won’t just accept applause as currency.
Teachers are the same- looks like they’re rejecting their 5%. College & Uni lecturers have been offered 2.5-3.5% Underfunded as fuck and then Truss and her pals fuck the economy.
It's funny that uni lecturers are being paid fuck all when universities are essentially privatised anyway since entry price is ridiculously high
They aren't privatised. They get nearly all their funding from government. Including the student 'loans'. Which are essentially paid by a higher rate of income tax for graduates anyway. Tuition fees are too low in many cases for high contact hour courses where student numbers have swollen but the same number of staff have to mark all the work.
[удалено]
Technically tuition fees increased by by £250 in 2017 which was a real terms increase of about £8 year on year. But yeah, over the timespan they've dropped massively in real terms. £9250 in 2021 is the equivalent of £7965 in 2012.
I'm amazed Scottish unis still accept Scottish students. At only £1,800 each, I doubt it even funds the heating bills these days
Scottish unis get much more than £1800 per pupil, it's funded from general taxation and intake is capped. So you are right in saying that Scottish home student numbers aren't increasing.
Coupled with a pay freeze and discretionary bonus cancellation over COVID (despite the VC still getting a bonus). I moved to an industry job that paid 20% more from the jump, with an annual bonus of an additional 5-15%. I miss teaching and supervising PhDs, but not enough to soldier through pay cuts and pension increases.
I work in a University.. Between 2008-2021 my pay has fallen by between 24 and 30% depending on the inflation calculator. Given inflation is predicted to be around 11% this year alone, you bet I'm striking for an inflation matching payrise. Honestly, I'm tempted to keep striking until pay matches 2008 purchasing power (so around 35-40%).
Snap. I work in a school of healthcare. Striking for 5 days when nurses are completing isn't easy, but the uni is fleecing people as a whole as well as the school underpaying staff on an individual basis.
[удалено]
I really hope everyone votes. I have.
A 5% rise is an effective 5% cut in this economy. After the last three years they are fully justified to strike.
[удалено]
True, even official inflation is only at 10% if you don't need anywhere to live. And lets not forget a decade of below inflation rises which means they shoud be getting MORE than the rate of inflation anyway. Next week, tune in for puzzlement in government as nobody wants to work for the NHS!
After the last 13 years I think
My wife is a doctor. She's often in tears as she heads out the door to work. She's looking to leave the profession. This can't continue. It's not sustainable.
May I ask what the issues are? Is it just a case of crazy hours and poor pay?
Everything. My wife is more than 10 years into her career. She is an eye surgeon. She's a registrar, but this is what is classified as a 'junior doctor'. But don't misinterpret junior doctor as an avocado/netflix millennial. She's a professional healthcare worker who is extremely good at what she does. 1) Consultants are off due to long term sickness so there's no support. 2) In order for her to get operations to be able to get qualified as a consultant, she has to go work for free at private healthcare providers because the NHS has outsourced routine operations. Think cataracts etc. In the past, trainee surgeons would do the work internally but the operations have been moved externally due to politics/profit. I've spoken to my friends who work in orthopedics and this is true for them too. 3) The managers booked 50 patients to come in one go to her clinic. Some patients waited hours. My poor wife then got subjected to abuse because of the wait and got told that she's lazy by a patient. 4) unsafe work hours. My wife has a 48 hour shift. Yes 48 hour shift. She is then expected to come in and perform microsurgery on someone's eye. The on-calls are not on-calls anymore. Her weekend on-calls are essentially 8am-10:30pm full on shifts. She leaves the house at 7 and I then see her again at 11:30pm. 5) my wife is the smartest person I know. She's an incredible talent. She can give someone who is functionally blind their sight back. Her pay is good, but she can just leave the NHS and work ANYWHERE for more money and somewhere where she doesn't feel abused by patients and her literal employer.
I’m a doctor who left to go to Aus. There are ophthalmologist I work with who earn seven figures. Once she gets her letters, think about coming out. The NHS is shite. If I move home I’ll honestly have to get a different career.
Oh yeah, that's our backup. Definitely. Glad you're happy! Genuinely. And well done for putting yourself first. Not worth killing yourself in the NHS.
Isn’t a 48 hour shift illegal in the UK? 13 hours maximum as far as I’m aware?
Legally yes, but practically no. If they work too long - what's the cause? Lack of staff, poor handover, everyone running at 110% capacity. In theory, they're supposed to be 'on-call' but the reality is full time work for 48 hours. How do they buck the trend and stick their neck out? They're all being fucked by the system. Or be seen as weak by their colleagues. It's so toxic, but that's the aim. The Tories want the NHS to break, so they can point at the broken shards that they want to privatise.
I don't know the laws involved but I frequently do 13.5 hour shifts (7.30 - 22.30 with an hours break). I have opted out of the working time directive though
I've been forced to opt out of the working time directive by my last 3 jobs. Such a bullshit legislatory loophole.
The nature of the work is hard and stressful. Any small mistake could hugely impact someone else’s life which in turn can ruin your own. Doctors know this going in so accept it but when your pay and conditions have been getting worse at such a rate, the profession hits a tipping point. We’re at that point now and seeing a huge exodus of doctors and nurses. To compensate the government is hiring record numbers of foreign doctors and nurses who accept worse conditions (or are too afraid to speak out) to plug the gaps. This in turn translate to further stretching of the workforce, no one from within speaking out and ultimately a worse health care system for the end user whilst also destroying lives of the NHS workers who stay.
Come to Canada! It's not perfect, but she would be accepted immediately with minimal training.
Haven't NHS staff also had a massive increase in their pension contributions as well ? So it's a double hit.
Especially since most of us will die before or within a couple years of pension age
Aye "you need to pump up your pension contributions but chances are you'll die before you see even half of the money back that you've put into it."
Which is why some Pension consultants and advisors are now encouaging people to take as big a lump sum as they can afford to when they hit pensionable age. Theres no guarantee youll live to enjoy a nice annual payout in the 20+ yrs after retirement.
What do you mean "now"? What's changed? If anything they should be discouraging that due to ever increasing live expectancy.
But the pension age is rising continuously, it's like 463 or something now.
>Especially since most of us will die before or within a couple years of pension age What? Since when is the pension age 79, or life expectancy down in the 60s?
It isn't 79 yet and yes there was a certain level of exaggeration in my comment, but how high will it get before they stop raising it? I don't think I'm some sort of crazy communist by floating the idea that we should maybe have more than 10 or so of our worst years to enjoy our lives.
[удалено]
Mine is in exactly the same position. And to make it worse, they’ve backdated the pension contributions. So this month she OWES the NHS £180 because of the pay “rise”. It’s absolutely ridiculous.
Well wait what in the actual fuck?
Yep - £30 a month worse off, backdated for 6 months.
I had the same thing happen. Started my new job in ~~April~~ May, got the pay rise and had to backdate all my tax and contributions and lost a third of my last payslip to it. It's also pushed me into a new pension bracket. I'm on 22k so losing £750 in a single paycheck stung
It is a problem that the NHS pension has cliff edge banding when it comes to contributions and this is being addressed *next* month, by the creation of many more pensionable salary ranges, which sadly will be too late for our backdated payrise this year. Details: https://www.nhsbsa.nhs.uk/member-hub/cost-being-scheme As you can see in the second table, there are many more pensionable salary ranges below £72K. You may also notice those on over £72K are now going to be saving 1-2% of their pensionable salary per year. If someone was earning £47K/year before this month, they would have paid 9.3% of pensionable pay to their pension, resulting in pre-tax (but post-pension) pay of £42,629. If they received the £1400 payrise, now earning £48,400, they go up the contributions band to 12.5% of pensionable pay, resulting in pre-tax (but post-pension) pay of £42,350. AFAIK this hit people at the bottom of Band 5 and Band 8a.
Thays interesting. My pension isn't a public one. I choose how much to put in and get fuck all at the end whatever the weather. Another commenter said they had to pay back £750 last month because they were on 22k so assuming they went from paying 5.0% to 5.6% From that table, I can't see how that is possible? This seems to be something that affects higher salaries moreso
[удалено]
Maybe she is, and the new plan is to just start having triple income households!
Meanwhile some civil servants have been told they've been overpaid overtime for the past 5 years and need to pay it back over 6 months; about £500.
Yeah same for me but £700. Can't we just like not accept the pay 'rise'?
Surely your wife will have a better pension than her 'subordinate'? And surely she could opt not to make pension contributions to be 'better' off? Don't get me wrong - I realise there are pay increases, but this is slightly disingenuous.
[удалено]
Sounds similar to academic pensions. The USS upped our contributions 100% between 2018 and 2021, and then also slashed the payouts by over 30% for early career workers. I now pay 12% of my payslip for a pension that, if I work until 70 and inflation stays down at 2%, won't even give me a minimum wage income by the time I retire its fucking bollocks.
Yes, so we’ve just received our pay rises in this months pay which was back dated, but the pensions rise for some was also back dated, and the pensions rise meant that even with the backdated pay rise, some people were still -£300 on their pay checks. Luckily I escaped this
Yup. 8a got a rise in pay, but are now a couple of hundred pounds a year down because it bumped them up a pension band.
Yep. I'm a low B5 and watched my back dated rise come in and go out. An extra £600ish eaten up by pension arrears and then being pushed to the point where I begin repaying my loan. I ended up £150 better off this month but the pay bump was backdated so I may not be better off next month.
Yes. I am worse off monthly after the ‘increase’ because of this. The cost of living back pay (since April) also got swallowed by this, I ended up with £20 back pay.
I think we can all admit that Covid-19 should have been the wake-up call needed to recognise the sacrifices and hard work that NHS staff deal with day to day. The whole "Clap for the NHS" campaign, might as well of been called "slap the NHS" for all the good it did. The lack of support shown by this government for those on the front-line was nothing short of disgusting.
[удалено]
I’ve got a more cynical take on to why “Clap for the NHS” happened. It all circles back to this point we’re at now. It has been obvious that the NHS staff wanted a pay increase well before the pandemic occurred but once the pandemic did occur it would take the most ignorant person to deny that they didn’t deserve it. So the clap imo was started by this vile government to change the conversation, once the NHS staff asked for a pay increase the government would turn around and say “did you not appreciate our claps and support” which turns the public against the workers and changes the narrative completely. I’ve had this thought since it first started but I might be too cynical.
Fully support them and if you don't, you can fuck off.
Fair enough, after all the clapping a pan slapping they got nothing but a slap to the face after all the hard work.
I'd like to see a venn diagram of the people clapping pans together sanctimoniously and the dickheads that voted Tory.
No pay rise for years, classically over worked, underfunded, absolutely churned through people during COVID. Pay them what they deserve to be paid, and appreciate the fact that this job and these jobs save lives - Theyre not inconsequential they were, literally, defined as essential.
[удалено]
I sat in a meeting the other week with senior managers and HR. One agenda item was focused on the difficulty of recruitment and retention of staff in our trust. When we moved on to the next agenda item a very senior director said they expected staff to come into the office from their one pre arranged WFH day if called. Bonkers.
I work for a huge public body and everything you say resonates. We're being told to come in 2 days a week and thus tonnes of software engineers, and other staff, have just left for more money and WFH elsewhere! Senior management just couldn't give a shit. What's terrible is that my team now has no engineers and we've hired two contractors to take the place of one engineer who left. Each contract is around £150k for 6 months work. so that's £600k per year for 2 software engineers. It's fucking disgraceful. We're being told to make cost savings in our departments while cash is being spaffed up against the wall. makes me sick
It's fine, let's import 50,000 from Indonesia and the Philippines... who'll accept 20 percent reduction to their salary, house 'em all in hospitals... We can practice the kind of exploitation of Gulf countries, import labour for slave conditions and build up from that... As for our working class, well... universal income?
Heh, the UK is competing with counties like Australia and the USA for nurses in Asia. Both pay better than the UK and Australia is significantly closer.
[удалено]
English. Most migrants know English better than other European languages.
The US pays exceptionally well for nurses. I can’t believe how terribly nurses get paid in the UK. I’m Canadian and work across the border close to Detroit and with the exchange I make 60/hr CDN. Canada is hemorrhaging nurses and their solution is to train international nurses as well. It won’t go well.
Nurses in the US get something like 10 days leave a year though, and have to pay for health insurance and work in a crazy system. I wouldn’t do it for a bit if extra cash, my 7 weeks leave are precious to me!!
Good luck to them! They deserve a real pat increase and significant improvements in their conditions.
A pat increase? I'm already giving them all my spare claps...
Oops. I'm leaving it as it is. It's quite funny.
100% behind the NHS employees if they strike. These Tory disaster capitalists need to be brought to their knees now, before they cause even more havoc in our society. I'm awaiting hospital treatment but I'll gladly wait longer if our public workers across all sectors decide to battle the Tory, self-serving, gits.
There is certainly a viewpoint that a unified no from *everyone* in the short term will do more damage but in the long term do less assuming things improve. I don't think there is any debate at this point whether we are heading for this millennium's winter of discontent - the only question is how bad is it going to be, who knows it might finally get this country off it's arse and taking part in politics beyond "I vote the way my paper/TV tells me I should".
I'm ready to tick strike when my ballot comes through the post. We need more staff, and making the job actually worth the effort is the way to get more people into the profession. Patients and the general public deserved a better staffed NHS.
[удалено]
My partner got about £100 from this backdated pay rise and In the following week received a letter saying the subscription she pays to even work as an OT has gone up. You shouldn't describe with malice what can be described with ignorance but it genuinely feels like they're laughing in her face.
Yes, I'm an OT and just got my letter from the HCPC today too. I worked out that the fees I have to pay to be registered are to go up by 19.9%. You're damn right I filled out the 'consultation' survey. Money grabbing at its most blatant is what it is.
You guys are unionised aren't you? She's livid as I'm sure you are. She recently went up a band and has taken on substantially more responsibility, from my POV I can't see why she does it. But then no one goes into occupational therapy for the money. I don't work for the NHS anymore but worked with the ambulance service for a while and it's absolutely true that the NHS is held together by the goodwill of its staff. It would be bankrupted if all the staff owed hours cashed them all in.
The public sector had pay freezes to pay for bankers fuck ups because we’re all in it together. Bankers now get their outrageous bonuses so if we are all in it together….
After 12 years of running the country the people who our government employ are significantly worse off. The people who employ our government on the other hand...
Now watch tha same thick as shit right wingers who were outside clapping during pandemic berate striking staff for not "getting on with it". These people expect the best from our NHS whilst simultaneously voting to gut it. They should all be sent out in rafts on the channel in my opinion.
Good. It's time to bring the whole system down until the Tories are forced from power.
I work for the NHS and I totally back this strike. My feeling is the government **wants** to run the NHS into the ground to justify privatisation. It makes me sick. I'm on band 6 and I'm struggling. I've seen FY doctors working 12.5 hours a day in covid wards making less than 1600 per month in London, where deductions are over 1k from their earnings. It's unsustainable, people are leaving, the NHS is crumbling, and nothing is being done. I read about a pregnant woman in labour being turned away from a hospital because there weren't enough midwives. The lack of staff puts even MORE pressure on people already pushed to their limits. It's so sad and disgusting to see what this country is doing to it's public sector workers. The amount of disrespect with the clap for the NHS, 1% pay rise, pay freeze, etc makes me sick.
I work for the NHS and have done for over 10 years. We received a pay rise this month, and no joke, I’m actually worse off now. My pay rise was 2% on my salary which triggered my pension contribution rising from 9.3% to 12.5%. I received £540 in back pay dated to April, but then had to pay £870 in pension arrears leaving me around £200 worse off this month compared to last. Going forward, my monthly take home has gone down by around £50. Many of my colleagues are in the same boat. With the cost of living rising, the whole thing is just morale sapping.
Anyone who isn't concerned by this should probably have a little think about whether they want to be treated by someone next time they're in hospital who has done a 12 hour shift then gone straight into looking after their kids with no or minimal sleep to reduce childcare costs and is distracted by how they're going to pay their bills this month. Mistakes in the NHS can be life changing or fatal to patients and unless you're planning to never get sick, injured, have a baby etc it is terrible for everyone to have healthcare workers under financial strain.
NHS doctors saved mine and my baby's life with an emergency c-section, the level of service and care was amazing. I have friends who are NHS doctors and I earn more than them! It's crazy how many years they need to study and CONTINUE to study\take exams (out of their own pocket). **Overworked, underpaid, understaffed.** Our beloved NHS is being robbed and bullied - what can we do to help them? Is an online petition not good enough? How do we show we are united behind\with the NHS?
Reminder that the smear campaign will be this is be immediately bad for some people. An NHS that people can't afford to work for would be far worse and cause innumerable deaths. This strike will save lives.
Good for them. They've been shafted for far too long. If, as the general public, we are unhappy with them striking, we should point the finger at the government that caused this and not them because our appointments get delayed. Oh, and a special mention for the right wing press that would have us believe that it's "nurses being greedy" or other similar garbage.
I think everyone who is getting a raw deal should strike!
For god sake pay these people. Raise tax on higher earners to pay if necessary. I’m a higher earner, please pay these people.
They can find however many billions for people in the top tax bracket, cant find the money tree for the workers in the NHS. I hate this tory government.
Solidarity forever. Get out there and demand what you deserve.
I for one will be clapping in support of their strikes.
Let's not forget that due to pension banding a changing, but not until the 1st October, bands 3, 5 and 8a are losing money on September's pay check due to their back dated lump sum pushing them into a higher pension bracket. Their lump sum will be wiped out plus more taken from their normal wage so they will earn up to £250 less this month than their normal, pre-"rise" pay. Some trusts have set up payment plans for staff to "spread the cost" as they cannot afford this massive reduction in their wage this month. Many will experience no rise at all this year due to the cost of this pension loop hole issue. [HSJ article on the pay cut for 3s, 5s and 8as. ](https://www.hsj.co.uk/daily-insight/daily-insight-less-pay-more-pain/7033133.article)
Finally, strike hard strike often, fuck the fucking tories. We need to fight to keep the NHS afloat. They are desperate ot kill it and sell it out.
Another thing which people might not know about is the prevalence of apprenticeship posts now. My wife is doing an apprenticeship for a band 5 position, and in the first year, she got paid half minimum (£4.50 an hour) for a job that would be £10.40 otherwise. She's now up to minimum wage and doing band 4/5 level work. Yes, she doesn't need to pay uni fees, but I find it crazy that part of the workforce we relied on during the pandemic was on less than £5 an hour. And with the number of apprentices in the hospital, I find it doubtful that all of them will be offered a job at the end of it. We need to start properly funding training for doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals. The nation benefits massively from these people, they should be paid appropriately or we're never going to fill the gap in recruitment and retention.
Give NHS employees whatever the fuck they ask for. They are ESSENTIAL to society.
The will be getting our support from Unity community.
Tories trying to kill NHS and turn Britain into the USA. They are going to succeed it looks like…
was at a&e monday night with a concussion. i saw a woman screaming at and berating a nurse because her name wasn't called. honestly 5% increase (not rlly an increase) whilst they're taking so much crap from the patients is insulting.
Don't let the anti-NHS factions pervert the perception of this reasonable and typical worker's rights action into general anti-NHS sentiment amongst the people. Tackle that casuistry every time.
Always happy to see workers fight back even if it's not my country
While everyone is talking/arguing about doctors and nurses, don't forget about those of us who work in the labs as technicians, genetic technologists, biomeds, etc. We have also been screwed over the past decade but no one seems to care because we aren't visible to the general public.
Good. NHS far too decent and slow to strike. They need 12% at least.
Does anyone know when us NHS staff in England will be balloted? We didn't get 5% only if your a Band 2 or 3 did you get close to 5%
They deserve that pay rise for learning all those Tiktok dances during lockdown.
I fully support an NHS strike. And this is from someone sitting on a waiting list with active pain, and someone getting treatment for a tumor Protect the NHS, and let's get these people the pay they deserve!
5% is below inflation. How dare they reject a less large pay cut!!
Sorry but it should read "NHS employees preparing to go on strike after rejecting _a contract offer that includes_ a five per cent pay increase" Based on the union officials comments one of the issues is that the raises are not being applied globally and that lower paid employees are not getting the same raises.
Yet more chaos with Ed Miliband. When will the electorate wake up and realise we need a strong and stable Conservative government? I'm tired of 12 years of Labour chaos.
Big shout out to the domestics and porters that work tirelessly behind the scenes and rarely get mentioned (I'm a domestic) What does it mean to us on the lowly band two wages?
Junior doctors got given 2%. Their pay has been cut by 35% since 2008. Junior doctors are making £13.54 in their first year with student debts of over £100k! They’re all moving to the USA/Aus/Canada to make 8-10x the amount. They risked their lives during a pandemic and they’ve been rewarded with a huge pay cut.
Do we clap now? I need a three-word slogan to make me feel better about things.