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basilrobbie

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There is an interesting article by Robert Colville in the ST today about nurses pay.

He reckons that the row over the 1% pay rise is something of a red herring. He says that "automatic pay progression" is the norm, the 2018 pay deal was supposed to end this, but didn't, and that for many nurses the 1% pay rise will be on top of an annual incremental increase within pay band. He also reckons that because of this system annual nurses pay has been going up by an average of 2.7% for a fair while now.

Is he right? It sounds plausible, but I don't know anything about his the NHS pay structure works.
 
It's his argument that's the red herring really, pay progression through levels of banding was brought in mid nineties as there were inequalities with the existing Whitley (?)* system, it was called Agenda for Change and was mildly overhauled recently apparently to simplify it except no one can understand the progression any more.

When creating a new role or filling an existing one it's matched nationally against fairly rigid criteria, so someone working for a trust in the South West can't be paid more for the same or similar role in the North East, the only difference is London. It's called job matching and means it takes for ** ever to get anyone in post.

The progression is there to encourage people to stay in a fairly harsh environment with shocking initial salaries, a Health Care Assistant, the guys who answer the ward bells at all hours of the night are a Band 2 job as it's classed as low skill, that's 18k a year starting salary, no one is going to put up with that for long. The pay rise is to supposed keep the various banding levels at least remotely in line with inflation, except now Band 2 starts higher and then hardy goes anywhere right up to the top of the banding, it's a grand a year increase and then that's it.

A band 5 job, so a staff nurse, is this;

0-1£12.77£24,907CALCULATE
1-2£12.77£24,907CALCULATE
2-3£13.83£26,970CALCULATE
3-4£13.83£26,970CALCULATE
4-5£14.05£27,416CALCULATE
5-6£14.05£27,416CALCULATE
6-7£15.70£30,615CALCULATE
7+£15.70£30,615


So you can see how the progression is a) not great and b) done after 7 years.

If you've been there years like a lot of us, you'll be at the top of your band with no more pay progression unless you get a higher band job, so the pay rise is the only increase.


*Whatever the Civil Service system was called, it was nicked in 46 and didn't change for 50 years.
 
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On Andrew Marr this morning it was argued that last year a 2.8% increase (I think?) was already approved and signed off by the Lords.
So is this 1% replacing that and not on top of the 2.8%?
 
Chunkylad said:
On Andrew Marr this morning it was argued that last year a 2.8% increase (I think?) was already approved and signed off by the Lords.
So is this 1% replacing that and not on top of the 2.8%?
Click to expand...
That was only doctors and dentists as it's a different pay review body, god knows why but presumably it dates back to the formation.
 
Good work in keeping us all informed @Lytham_fy8 where the agenda pushers would have it from a different angle.

Wouldn't be so bad for the nurses if they had an inflation busting pension to fall back upon.
 
Lytham_fy8 said:
It's his argument that's the red herring really, pay progression through levels of banding was brought in mid nineties as there were inequalities with the existing Whitley (?)* system, it was called Agenda for Change and was mildly overhauled recently apparently to simplify it except no one can understand the progression any more.

When creating a new role or filling an existing one it's matched nationally against fairly rigid criteria, so someone working for a trust in the South West can't be paid more for the same or similar role in the North East, the only difference is London. It's called job matching and means it takes for ** ever to get anyone in post.

The progression is there to encourage people to stay in a fairly harsh environment with shocking initial salaries, a Health Care Assistant, the guys who answer the ward bells at all hours of the night are a Band 2 job as it's classed as low skill, that's 18k a year starting salary, no one is going to put up with that for long. The pay rise is to supposed keep the various banding levels at least remotely in line with inflation, except now Band 2 starts higher and then hardy goes anywhere right up to the top of the banding, it's a grand a year increase and then that's it.

A band 5 job, so a staff nurse, is this;

0-1£12.77£24,907CALCULATE
1-2£12.77£24,907CALCULATE
2-3£13.83£26,970CALCULATE
3-4£13.83£26,970CALCULATE
4-5£14.05£27,416CALCULATE
5-6£14.05£27,416CALCULATE
6-7£15.70£30,615CALCULATE
7+£15.70£30,615


So you can see how the progression is a) not great and b) done after 7 years.

If you've been there years like a lot of us, you'll be at the top of your band with no more pay progression unless you get a higher band job, so the pay rise is the only increase.


*Whatever the Civil Service system was called, it was nicked in 46 and didn't change for 50 years.
Click to expand...
Pay progression in most of the civil service went in 1992 with the move to Agency status. Never came back.
 
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