19:43
Tieng Anh Vui
Unions have criticised plans to impose further squeezes on NHS pay in England.
Chancellor George Osborne had already capped rises across the public sector at a below-inflation 1%, but the Department of Health wants to cancel the increase for its 1.3m staff.
Instead it wants to use funding intended for the 1% rise to "modernise" pay structures.
Health trusts are under pressure to make savings and the NHS wage bill accounts for around 40% of its budget.
In its submission to the NHS pay review body, the government says the planned 1% award is not affordable alongside the current system of small, automatic annual rises.
It says these increments - linked to length of service and satisfactory performance - add a further 2% to salary costs.
And it points to a staff survey showing high levels of motivation and morale.
"The government's view, therefore, remains that basic pay increases should only be implemented if there is strong evidence that recruitment, retention, morale or motivation issues require this."
'Inflammatory'
The Department of Health wants the pay review bodies - which are due to make a recommendation on pay early next year - to defer the planned 1% pay rise while it negotiates moves to seven-day working with unions.
But staff representatives reacted angrily to the plans.
"What they have done is inflammatory," said Christina McAnea, head of health at Unison and joint chair of the NHS Staff Council.
"They must have known how unions would react. We are not going to negotiate while a gun is held to our head for a paltry 1% pay rise - our members will not react well to that."
Dr Mark Porter, chair of the BMA Council added: "We recognise fully the economic constraints the NHS is working under but the continued erosion in the real value of contracts for doctors has now reached a critical point."
'Blames staff'
Setting out the government's spending plans in June, the chancellor said ministers were working to "remove automatic pay rises" for teachers, health professionals, prison and police staff.
The department drew attention to Mr Osborne's comments and confirmed it wanted NHS pay to have "stronger links to performance, quality and productivity".
But Rachael Maskell, from the Unite union told the Guardian newspaper Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt could be "trying to act in an even more draconian way than the Treasury with regards to staff who work across the NHS."
She added: "He blames the staff on a regular basis. Now he want to further cut their terms and conditions."
Dr Porter told the newspaper: "For the government to imply that unless NHS staff endure what is effectively another year of pay cuts they will put patient safety at risk is insulting at best."
Đăng ký: Tieng Anh Vui
Posted in: 
0 comments:
Post a Comment