Health unions have accused the UK government of treating their members like “second-class emergency workers” after firefighters were offered backsliding pay rises despite ministers refusing to open settlements this year for ambulance workers and nurses.
The Fire Brigades Union on Thursday postponed plans to announce a date for the first national strike over pay in 20 years after local government representatives made better offers at the last round of talks, including a 7 per cent pay rise for the current financial year back to July 2022.
The union noted the proposal, which also includes a 5 percent pay rise from this July, is “still below inflation” but will hold off on industrial action while consulting with members.
Nick Chard, chairman of National Employers, the body that negotiates pay on behalf of all fire and rescue services in England, said: “We hope this offer will be accepted so firefighters can receive this significant pay rise as soon as possible. prevented.”
The offer has angered ambulance unions, which were part of the biggest walkout in the history of the health service, along with nurses, in England and Wales earlier this week. The dispute remains deadlocked after ministers again refused to reveal the wage settlement for the current financial year, which averages a pay rise of about 4 percent.
The government has instead insisted nurses and ambulance unions, which have launched a series of strikes since mid-December, join the NHS’s independent pay review body on settlements for 2023-24. The health union said last month it would not join the process until this year’s pay dispute is resolved.
The ambulance union shows the contrast between fire employers’ willingness to negotiate – through a national wage bargaining arrangement involving all stakeholders – and the government’s continued refusal to talk directly about pay with them.
“Firefighters have been given an offer . . . but the government still won’t talk about pay with ambulance workers,” said Rachel Harrison, national secretary of the GMB trade union. He said his members had felt like “second-class citizens” in relation to their Scottish and Welsh counterparts, who had received better offers from their respective governments, and now felt like “second-class emergency workers” after the offer to the FBU.
Unite general secretary Sharon Graham, noting that firefighters’ union leaders have been in direct talks with their employers, added: “It’s not rocket science – to sort these things out, you have to go around the table, the unions and the employers, and find out what can be done. so compromise.”
Monthly data released by NHS England on Thursday showed a total of 7.2 million people were waiting to start non-emergency hospital treatment in January, after falling in December for the first time since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
NHS national medical director Professor Sir Stephen Powis said the strike – which has led to the postponement of around 137,000 appointments since December – had “had no impact on progress on the delayed waiting list”.
Sara Gorton, head of health at Unison, said the government was “playing chicken” with the potential danger of an NHS attack on the public. “The government’s strategy seems to be that until the end of the salary review process. . . They are punishing the public for two or three more months,” he said.
The NHS review process is a poor substitute for the kind of negotiations firefighters go through, he says, because it doesn’t give stakeholders the chance to change their views across the table and also means there’s no way to link headline pay to other issues around career progression. . or flexible working, for example, which is key to staff retention.
The Royal College of Nursing, the main nursing union, declined to comment.
Unison’s 15,000 members across five ambulance trusts are set to stage a fourth day of strike action on Friday. Unions are preparing to step up their campaign, with votes due next week on the UK’s remaining ambulance trusts and the NHS blood and transplant service which could attract another 13,000 staff.
Another strike action by the Universities and Colleges Union, which represents staff in higher education, disrupted teaching at 150 universities for two days from Thursday, part of a series of 18-day walkouts until March 22 in a long-running dispute over pensions and pay.
Meanwhile, the RMT executive committee had a meeting on Monday to discuss two 9 percent offers “payment and renewal” by the rail industry in a bid to break the wave of attacks that have hobbled the network over the past seven months.
Industry bosses are increasingly worried that RMT leaders will reject one or two offers this week, after consulting with members. RMT declined to comment.
Additional reporting by Philip Georgiadis and Bethan Staton