NHS workers outside the south-west…

Watch closely… I suspect you will be next. 😕

It seems we in the sou’west are the guinea pigs…

the move by the South-West Pay, Terms and Conditions Consortium could erode the NHS’s long-established system of national bargaining and agreed pay scales.

It’s not just “NHS workers” who might be concerned about this. As someone who doesn’t work for the NHS I’m still however concerned that my NHS is being shafted by a political party which pledged at the last election to leave it alone.

political brinkmanship, I hope

*wonders if the next labour govt would force them to reverse this*

This will be fun in Dorset, we’ve already got the biggest gap between average salary and average house price in the UK.

Not sure how this will impact upon my colleagues in the NHS, but Local Authorities have been pissing about with professionals who lack a national pay deal for years.

Dorset County Council have been starting their social workers on 5K less than Bournemouth and Poole Borough Councils’ social workers for years…upshot being that nobody wants to work there. If anything they should be paying at least 5K more to compensate them for having to travel to Dorchester each day. It’s the same with their solicitors, in 2009 they were offering 21K for newly qualified solicitors…predictably enough nobody was really going for that when they could earn more as paralegals.

Like they’ve reversed every other policy they’ve disagreed with whilst in opposition?

*wonders if the next labour govt would force them to reverse this*

If recent history teaches anything it’s that Labour governments do not reverse what the Tories do – they just moan about it. Don’t expect a future Labour government to reverse anything.

EDIT : As pointed out by my learned friend.

I can only speak for Probation, but we were forever being messed about under Labour (and nothing has changed). It doesn’t matter who you vote for, the Government always gets in!

*wonders if the next labour govt would force them to reverse this*

was thinking that it might make the next manifesto really – they’d obviously be pressurised to make some sort of definitive policy decision prior to an election

I wouldn’t be too concerned about it being included in a Labour election manifesto. In the 1997 manifesto there was a commitment by Labour to renationalise the railways, but it was clear from the onset that Blair had absolutely no intention of doing that.

The consortium has told staff that unless they accept changes that the RCN calls “draconian”, the jobs of 6,000 of the 68,000 staff employed by the 20 trusts could go. Pay typically takes up about 65% of a hospital trust’s budget.

So if the Trusts are confident that they can maintain the services without these 6000 employees, why the f*** are we paying for them?

Sounds like its the management that needs to ‘walk the plank’.

The problem is that the NHS like other public services is seen as a kind of piggy bank which can be raided at will by which ever political party bunch of clowns we choose to run the country. Attempts to reduce the amount it costs while claiming that the quality of service will not suffer seem to me to be a crystal clear admission that the current economic crisis cannot be resolved by those in ‘power’, and their only answer is to resort to ideologically driven nonsense in an attempt to curry favour with an uninformed and so far docile population.

We currently have a M.A.R.S. scheme running (mutually agreed resignation scheme) they’re trying to shed staff, the rest of us taking up the slack on our frozen wages of course. I see a hospital closure in my near future

The problem is that the NHS like other public services is seen as a kind of piggy bank which can be raided at will by which ever political party bunch of clowns we choose to run the country.

Yeah but that’s not actually true is it ? Far from raiding the piggy bank money allocated to health has increased substantially, specially under Labour.

so straight talking from anhs management team.. we can carry on emplying everyone but you’ll all earn less, or we carry on paying what we do to fewer of you..

frankly if the nhs roles are so not about the money as is often touted by these hard working pillars of the community, taking a bit less and ensureing all your mates keep thier jobs would seem fair and equitable.

of course if getting evry dollar you can out of a politically corrupt organisation is what your after and the role is secondary to your personal financial gain.. go for it

Strange its the same job wherever you work so equal pay for all , with national negotions, you wouldnt want people to move to beter paid areas, and neglect the proles and serfs in working class areas, like what i livein.

But then come privatisation wages will be reduces for most and services decimated.

Perhaps I should have specified that my comments fit more with our current government. Pension fannying about, bolstered by a huge media campaign to drive that wedge between public and private workers, a wage freeze, constant budget cuts which hospitals have to achieve and which have largely been done by cutting or not replacing staff…

We have also just been through the Agenda for Change fiasco; millions of pounds spent on new job descriptions, on making sure that people were paid for the job that they actually did… only it never really worked like that, despite all the cash that was squandered on it.

surprised it’s taken so long to do this,I’ve been in local government for 30years and it’s always been the case that jobs in the nice parts of england(dorset,cornwall,north yorkshire)paid less than the same job in home counties.That doesn’t make it right though.

I wonder how much, if any, economics plays a part in life and death decisions and more importantly if that changes from government to government.

Just another step on the way to privatisation I reckon..
Protected pensions- check.
Nationally agreed wages- check.
….?