Calls made for NHS pay talks to reopen

The government has been urged to reopen pay talks by the leaders of more than a million health workers.

According to the Press Association, the calls were made as a three-year deal agreed around six months ago was leaving thousands of NHS staff in financial difficulty.

Nurses and other employees were facing “mounting press”, ministers were told, including a record number of nurses seeing debt management advice or deal with the threat of having their home repossessed.

Unions accepted the terms of the deal, which was worth around eight per cent, despite opposition from sum members due to the fact it was below the rate of inflation, the resource notes.

Karen Jennings, national officer of the union Unison, which has a membership of more than 1.3 million, said staff across the NHS accepted the three-year deal earlier this year believing predictions that inflation had reached its peak and would begin to fall.

“This clearly hasn’t happened. No one then could have predicted the worldwide credit crunch or that inflation would hit a 16-year high. NHS workers, particularly the low paid, are finding it extremely tough to make ends meet,” she added.

Mr Jennings noted the NHS needs to be an attractive career option and as such, that means paying workers “decently”.