Minister urges the UK Government to follow Wales with new pay offer for NHS workers
Welsh Health Minister Eluned Morgan has encouraged the UK Government to sit down to “talk and listen” with unions after strikes by NHS workers in Wales were largely suspended thanks to a new pay offer tabled on Friday.
Asked if she hoped that the suspension of industrial action by unions was the “light at the end of the tunnel” for strike action by NHS workers in Wales, she said: “I do hope so, but obviously the final decision will be by the members of these unions. But I think what’s important is that they understand that this is the only deal in town.
“The end of the financial year is coming very soon, and obviously the money disappears at the end of the financial year so that there is an issue for people to consider there.
“So I do hope that people recognise that we’ve worked really hard on this, that we are restricted in how much we can offer because of the money we get from the UK Government.
“And I do think that there’s a lesson here for the UK Government – UK Government needs to understand that in order to get any kind of deal you need to sit down you need to talk and you need to listen.
“They’re not doing any of that, and I would encourage them to do that.”
3% increase
Following the latest round of talks with the unions last week, the Welsh Government offered NHS workers an additional 3% pay increase, of which 1.5% is consolidated so will be in pay packets year-on-year, on top of the Pay Review Body recommendations, which have already been implemented in this year.
The offer will also be backdated to April 2022 and if a pay deal is agreed for NHS staff in England, any resulting Barnett consequential would result in a further pay increase for staff in Wales.
Welsh ministers also made a number of commitments to enhance staff well-being, on which negotiations will continue this week.
The NHS is expecting major upheaval across England this week as nurses from the RCN stage walk-outs alongside GMB and Unite paramedics, call handlers and other staff at ambulance trusts.
It is the first-time ambulance workers and nurses have walked out on the same day.
Nurses will strike again on Tuesday, ambulance workers again on Friday and physiotherapists on Thursday.
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Has the Baroness or Mark Drakeford said anything about the devastating tragedy unfolding in the Middle East ?
Nothing about it on BBC Wales either, is Wales living in an international news blackout !
Come back Ifan this is turning into a parish magazine…
What has that woman got to smile about? Oh, I know, sitting at the top table, good wages and pension pot and more honours in the offing…
Not on her own in that respect MM. Most of the 60 and their leading officials are primarily members of the fat cats club ( Wales branch) whose aspirations are limited to filling their own boots from as cushy a number as possible and dishing out favours to chums occasionally. Time for big changes otherwise this country will go down the plughole for definite.
Anything they might have said would be of no relevance to likes of Erdogan and Assad. Relief packages sent to that part of the world more likely to be stolen or at least skimmed by the local kleptocracy. Really sad for the people of those countries who could do with a bit of honest intervention.
That is not the point…So let let them suffocate under the rubble eh!
It might have spoken to the Turkish, Syrian and Kurdish communities living in this country, who no doubt have many family members among the dead, injured, trapped and freezing homeless…of course they are mostly not Orthodox Christians are they?
Not even a word from Adam Price who I guess is deputising for MD given MD’s own family tragedy…
Not the point I was trying to make. There is a real purpose in sending rescue teams and other disaster recovery personnel and experts to those countries. The losses come when funds and “saleable” goods get shipped over and then disappear.
After the daylight robbery of the billions that the UK has been subjected to by the Westminster Looters Co-op, aid is chicken feed not the Marshall Plan, but of course half of it has already gone to Gendarmes to beat up refugees on the Calais front and political villains in Rwanda…
The lady’s credibility as a health minister in Wales is dire and she think a tory Gov pays any attention to her?… pointless.