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The NHS Pay Cartel – regional pay by the back door

August 12, 2012 9:48 am

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The Olympic opening ceremony rightly celebrated the NHS in all its glory.

as a national treasure and as something we need to fight for. More than 600 nurses and NHS staff were included in the spectacle on the insistence of director, Danny Boyle. He went one step further in the rehearsals where, as well as urging the audience not to spoil the surprise, a message was flashed on screen saying “Don’t spoil the NHS”. I am sure that Lansley and co would know just who it was aimed at.

The pressure from the Government on Trusts to find £20bn in so called “efficiency” savings, coupled with the massive upheaval and disruption caused by the Health and Social Care Act, is putting the whole NHS under strain.

At a national level employers have worked up, at the request of the government, a set of proposals to alter Agenda for Change– the agreement covering the pay, terms and conditions of NHS staff, with the exception of doctors and dentists. These proposals are currently out for consultation with UNISON members, following which further discussions with employers are already scheduled for early autumn. But these negotiations are now being put under threat by a rogue NHS cartel.

20 Trusts across the South West have decided to break away by storming ahead with their own radical changes to local staffs’ pay and conditions. These plans threaten to usher in a new era of industrial unrest and discontent among nurses and other healthcare staff, as well as undermining the quality of patient care across the whole region.

The activities of the consortium are both premature and draconian.  There has been signs recently, particularly among livberal Democrat MPs, that the is back-pedalling from the disastrous notion of regional pay. At the same time, these South West proposals appear to be introducing regional pay by the back door.

Documents obtained by UNISON through Freedom of Information requests demonstrate that the consortium is aware of some of the consequences.  Their project document states that their work is ‘not without risk, in terms of legal challenge, industrial unrest, impact upon staff morale and engagement and reputation management’. You would think that that would have been enough to make at least some of the Trusts think again?

However, in identifying these risks, we don’t think they have fully taken into account the scale of the anger of NHS staff or the likely impact on patient care and on NHS services. Over the years the NHS has suffered from staff shortages, particularly specialist staff, so what is there to keep them in the South West when they can earn more at a Trust outside the cartel? And if that happens it is patients who will be the losers.

UNISON is fighting these plans every step of the way and has already held a meeting in Parliament to brief MPs from across the region. But we need to build support across the region and across the country:

  • Contact your local MP and voice your concerns around the SW Pay Cartel and the impact it will have on the NHS.

Christina McAnea is Head of Health for UNISON

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  3. Young Labour regional rep election results
  4. Osborne’s dangerous assault on our regional economies
  5. EDL’s knock on the door for all of us
  • JoeDM

    Since when are our dirty, super-bug infected hosipitals a “national treasure”?

    Over the past 10 years I have known three people to go into hospital for surgery only to have their recovery put seriously at risk through hospital aquired infection.  One died sometime later of the ongoing effects of the infection and the other two had their lives seriously impacted.

    The NHS does the emergency stuff and the advanced sexy-techie health care very well indeed.   Unfortunately when it comes down to everyday humdrum stuff we are way behind  the rest of the developed world.    

    Labour doubled spending on the NHS and under the coalition spending is still going up.   Where is the money going?

    • Real Slim Shandy

       Oh dear another Daily Mail reader who can’t get beyond the large headline bold print.

      • treborc

        Well MRSA seems to burst onto the hospital after labour has sold off the cleaning contracts to a private company. I caught MRSa twice after two major operations, and I have to say the private cleaning firm only cleaned the wards twice in a week the rest of the time it was a quick wipe and they’d be gone.

        Where as the NHS team use to ensure the ward was cleaned every day, each ward had a cleaning team of four people, the private firm had four people cleaning five wards, profits.

  • jaime taurosangastre candelas

    There’s nothing wrong with regional pay – different regions have different costs, and the concept of “London Weighting” is well accepted by the unions across many public services for many years. As a matter of observation, people are paid at different rates in different countries, and the unions do not appear to whine about that.

    The use of the word “cartel” is also clearly wrong, by definition.  20 Trusts out of 162 is not a cartel, it is a minority.  The spelling and grammar in the article is poor.  Is this an indication of the quality of intellect and rigorous checking of detail that the unions bring?

    • jaime taurosangastre candelas

      {It seems that Christina McAnea is some form of professional negotiator for the union.  See http://www.linkedin.com/pub/christina-mcanea/22/b83/118 . All I can say is that if her article above is any reflection of the intellectual quality of her negotiation, the union and her members get very poor service.  They should expect a lot more for the subscriptions they pay.}

    • Mr Chippy

      Jaime, If you believe Christine (yes I know her from my former Labour Party branch) is a dinosaur your comment is imbued with cliche and very little substance which questions your own intellect and logic.

      The current pay system in the NHS produced a single pay spine for over 1m staff. The system was informed by the prinicples of equal pay for work of equal value. The sytem replaced about 20 different bargaining arrangements. There were flexiblities in the system for high costs areas (like London Weighting) and hard to recruit occupations. Hardly informed by backward thinking trade unions.

      What the cartel calls local pay are undisguised pay cuts. I happen to believe that most health workers are not paid enough as it is. 

      Colin

       

      • jaime taurosangastre candelas

        Mr Chippy,

        well, I have a different view.  A national pay scheme is a nonsense, in my opinion, particularly if it tries to aggregate over a million people.

        The only negotiation that has any validity is the face to face negotiation conducted by the worker and the employer.  It is only a trade between time, labour and intellect.

        I don’t take note of the national spine negotiations – I have abstracted myself from that system and my employers have accepted that I have.  This is the beauty of not being a member of any damned union. I also find that my professional indemnity insurance and legal representation are also cheaper than the BMA can organise for an equivalent level of cover.

        I find I do rather better in negotiations than the national system.  You need to look into the employer’s eye each year and make the case for what you as an individual can bring, tell them your price for doing so and let them take it or leave it.  For the last 4 years I have not needed to negotiate – I told them my price and they accepted it.  This is hardly difficult.  Of course, they have the ability to not accept it and to counter-propose something different, or to reject it outright, and that is a risk I run.  But when you deal with an organisation as inefficient as the NHS, well they do not really have much to counter-propose.

        • Mr Chippy

          So you believe it would be more efficient to have over 1m individual negotiations? Barmy. This is totally disfunctional. You should also see the evidence when local pay was last tried by the Tories.

          How would you differentiate between the contribution of over 500,000 nurses on a reasoned and non-discriminatory basis.

          Your reference to the BMA indicates to me you are Doctor. You are substituting your experience as a highly qualified clinician with negotiating ‘muscle’ for that of the vast majority of health service workers without whom the care you deliver would probably suffer.

  • AnotherOldBoy

    Having read the reference to ‘so called “efficiency” savings’ you don’t need to read to the bottom of this piece to know that its author is a trade union official speaking for the status quo and vested interests.

    It is, of course, no surprise to find that Unison is as opposed to efficiency savings as it is to local pay deals to reflect local circumstances.   They may have seen of Tony “Scarback” Blair, but I hope that the present government is made of sterner stuff and will sort Unison out on both efficiency savings and local pay.

    • Mr Chippy

      So is it only trade union officials who represent vested interests or do you believe employers represent unpartisan comment?

      The current pay system in the NHS produced a single pay spine for all staff and replaced about 20 different negotiating councils.

      A member of staffs’ place on the spine is informed by the principles of equal pay for work of equal value.

      There are flexibilities in the system for high costs areas and hard to recruit occupations.

      Hardly things of backward thinking trade unions.

      What the SW cartel describes as local pay are pay cuts. You may ask should workers in the SW get the same pay as those in other regions but any pay sytem must have a floor otherwise where does it end?

      • PeterBarnard

        Mr Chippy, You may be interested in the report by Incomes Data Services “Location based pay differentiation,” which looks at pay policies for private sector large multi-site companies, eg Tesco and Sainsbury’s operate national pay rates, with enhanced pay in the South East. They certainly don’t pay a different rate in the north east, compared with the south west, nor in Bristol compared with Blackburn, or Cheltenham vs Carlisle but there is also a subtle “large town” differential for Sainsbury’s.

        If hard-nosed outfits like Tesco and Sainsbury’s don’t operate regional pay, there must be a reason … and I think that it’s complexity.

        By the way – Just Cuts next to Wrexham Bus Station : £3.50 for a haircut for an old codger like me.

        • treborc

          Tesco and Asda tend to accept the min wage rate do they not.

          • jaime taurosangastre candelas

            They have to (and that is a good thing) – they are proper businesses trading in the UK, and the minimum wage is the law.  Frankly, I believe it should be higher by at least a pound, and on top of that turned into a “living wage” which would vary regionally.

          • PeterBarnard

            According to the report, Tesco’s national minimum rate was £7.00 an hour, ie above the minimum wage. Very few retailers paid the absolute national minimum wage.

        • jaime taurosangastre candelas

          But Peter, surely by the evidence you produce, they do operate regional pay (“enhanced pay in the south east”)?

          What is the difference in between regional pay and enhanced pay in the south east which you say is not regional pay?  It seems to me that the south east is indeed a region.

          • Mr Chippy

            Jaime you display your ignorance. The current NHS pay system can pay High Cost Area allowances. The only recommendation is that if paid this is done across a health economy to prevent ‘beggar thy neighbour’ employment practices.

            Sorry I should declare that I led negotiations on the Job Evaluation strand of talks which led to the current NHS pay system for that ‘damned’ union Amicus.

          • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_ZPXYLRVP4XOIGGDJWAL6HUO7U4 David

            re: “you display your ignorance”

            Ah the old “if-I-insult-you-then-you must-surely-find-my-argument-more-compelling” gambit.

          • Mr Chippy

            Just there appeared to be no knowledge of parts of the NHS pay system in previous posts.

          • jaime taurosangastre candelas

            Mr Chippy,

            I’m sure that you did a very good job.  Really, I am.

            I have abstracted myself from the NHS collective system, and have been allowed to do so (I make my own negotiation with my employer), so to me what is nationally negotiated is of little personal importance.  However, I look at it to ensure that I know if those who work for me are adequately rewarded.

            Actually, I am not sure how I display my ignorance.  I am aware of regional differences and special payments.  I do not believe that I have said that they do not exist.  I welcome such things, as a step on the road to everyone negotiating their own salary.

            I am also aware that in terms of LL readership, I am probably considerably on my own in not belonging to a union, and indeed having a visceral dislike of such membership.  Of course I understand that.  But, consider what happens:  I have a significantly better and more suited relationship with my employer – it’s not really about money, I’ve got about £6,500 ahead of the spine since I took responsibility for my own pay, which is hardly a lot.  But I have a holistic contract of employment that suits me and my employer far more than any nationally negotiated contract, the Trust has the ability to sue me or fire me for failing to meet targets (I am completely comfortable with this), and they cannot do that for others, and I have more say in the running of my department.  This seems to me to be a “win-win” situation for both sides.

            I do believe that God put man on this earth to look out for him or herself and it should be a matter of pride to do so, not to bend the neck to the endless dumbing down of collective agreements.

          • Mr Chippy

            Thanks for engaging in the discussion but I think we are fundamentally at odds with each other so lets us agree to disagree.

          • PeterBarnard

            I take “regional pay” to differentiate between all regions, eg north east, north west, Y & H, east & west midlands, east, London, south east, south west, Scotland and Wales. If you read the report, there are some very broad zones that national operators use.

            There is no doubt in my mind that the (it appears to be on the back-burner now) “regional pay” proposed by Mr Osborne was nothing less than a crude attempt to lower wages, and they were looking at house prices only.

            As I say, if Tesco see fit to pay the same in Chester as in Cardiff and Cheltenham, I guess that they know what they are doing. In addition, housing is only (in aggregate) about 15-20% of consumer expenditure. Regional pay based on total cost of living would be enormously complex to administer, down to the detail of looking at the cost of a cut and dry in Chester, Cardiff and Cheltenham ; the cost of gasoline and diesel likewise ; the purchase price of (say) Mondeos, Astras and so on.

          • jaime taurosangastre candelas

            Well, it should not be so very complex.  The “basket of prices” used to compute inflation is a pretty good start, and regional average housing costs are readily available.  It seems to me to be a not very complex spreadsheet, and an assignation of pay code to each employee based on their region.

            Whether it is worth the time of these big companies to do so is a different matter, but as a point of principle, there is nothing to suggest that regional pay variations is some great capitalist evil when between countries there is great variation (even within the EU, as the Germans and Greeks discover), and the unions themselves do not query London weighting.

          • PeterBarnard

            Jaime,

            (i) ” …it should not be so very complex.” Have you any idea how many items go into the calculation of the national RPI and CPI indices? Now do that – as a company – ten or twelve times for each region within the UK.

            (ii) And, once you have done that for regions, why not do it for towns within regions … prosperous Tunbridge Wells, for example, vs not-quite-as-prosperous (I think) hastings.

            (ii) there are great differences in wages between countries because there are great differences in productivity between countries. Read John Kay’s “The Truth About Markets.” The difference in wages between countries and regions within the UK are not comparable.

            (iii) it seems apparent that it is definitely not worth the effort of these private sector companies to drill down to the level that Mr Osborne and other Conservative-types who know the price of everything and the value of nothing. It also seems apparent that the capitalistic Tesco and Sainsbury’s know that this particular game isn’t worth the candle.

            In short : “regional pay” when used as Mr Osborne contemplated is nonsense.

        • Mr Chippy

          Shame I could walk to Wrexham bus station but I can self administer my hair treatment with clippers.

  • hp

    Personally, I think national pay is the way forward in public services.
    I would remove London weighting, too.

  • Pingback: Public want regional pay plan axed - including a majority of Tory and Lib Dem voters | Left Foot Forward

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