Members of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) have rejected the Government's award of a 5.5% pay rise.
Two-thirds of the 145,000 members of the RCN who voted online said the pay award – announced in July shortly after Labour won the election - was not fair and had higher expectations from the Government.
Professor Nicola Ranger, RCN’s general secretary said: ‘We are witnessing a fundamental shift in the determination of nursing staff to stand up for themselves, their patients and the NHS they believe in. Our members do not yet feel valued, and they are looking for urgent action, not rhetorical commitments.’
She said that nurses were concerned by ‘understaffed shifts, poor patient care and nursing careers trapped at the lowest pay grades’.
- Almost half of nurses working in GP practices received no pay rise last year
- RCN urges Government to begin pay negotiations
- RCN Wales members reject additional pay offer
The pay rise announcement comes just days after junior doctors voted for a deal that would see their pay rise by 22% over two years. At that time, Professor Ranger said that they did not ‘begrudge doctors their pay rise,’ but only wanted the ‘same fair treatment from the government’.
Wes Streeting, Health and Social Care Secretary said: ‘We know what nurses have been through in recent years and how hard it is at the moment. That's why, despite the bleak economic inheritance, the Chancellor awarded them with an above-inflation pay rise.’
He promised that the party would work with the NHS staff to get healthcare back to its feet from the ‘worst crisis in its history’.
Meanwhile, RCN members in Scotland have voted to accept the 5.5% pay increase for 2024-25. A Scottish Government spokesperson said that the different outcome could be because the Scottish offer ‘starts from a higher baseline’ than the English offer.