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Doctors’ leaders are considering taking strike action after ministers announced they would receive a 4% pay rise following the latest review of public sector pay.
The British Medical Association (BMA) said the pay rise does not go far enough in restoring historical pay freezes.
Other NHS workers in England, including nurses, midwives, and physiotherapists — among other frontline workers — will be offered a 3.6% pay uplift, effective from 1 April, Health Secretary Wes Streeting said.
Union Responses and Ballots
NHS staff who are members of the GMB union and the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) will be asked to vote on whether to accept the award. The GMB ballot opens today and closes on 17 July.
RCN general secretary and chief executive Professor Nicola Ranger warned the pay award was “entirely swallowed up by inflation and does nothing to change the status quo – where nursing is not valued, too few enter it and too many quit”.
The total cost of pay rises across the public sector are “worth £6.9 billion in total”, Downing Street said.
NHS staff in Wales are also likely to be given the same pay award, as the Welsh Government has accepted the same recommendations.
The increases, recommended by independent pay review bodies, are above the rate of inflation, which jumped to 3.5% in April, up from 2.6% in March and the highest since January 2024.
However, Professor Philip Banfield, the BMA’s chairman of council, warned it was already considering strike action, as the union believes the pay rise does not do enough to restore doctors’ pay after previous salary freezes.
“Doctors’ pay is still around a quarter less than it was in real terms 16 years ago and today’s ‘award’ delays pay restoration even more, without a government plan or reassurance to correct this erosion of what a doctor is worth,” he said.
Reactions From Health Leaders and Politicians
Isabel Lawicka, director of policy and strategy at NHS Providers, said: “It’s essential that the NHS can recruit and retain colleagues to meet the huge challenges facing the health service, both in dealing with immediate operational pressures and delivering the transformation in care that will be required in the coming years.
“We hope today’s announcement will help to achieve this, though given ongoing pay disputes, it is a difficult starting point.”
Edward Argar, shadow health secretary, said: “We warned Labour that the unions would simply come back for more when they gave in to the strikes and agreed to above-inflation pay demands with no strings attached. Now, with the threat of renewed strikes once again casting a shadow over the NHS, that warning is becoming reality.”
Other Public Sector Pay Awards
Elsewhere, the National Education Union (NEU), the largest union for teachers, threatened to “register a dispute” with the government unless it fully funds the 4% pay rise for teachers, part of which is currently due to be covered by existing school budgets.
Most members of the armed forces will be given a 4.5% pay rise, while senior members of the military will receive a 3.75% rise.
Senior civil servants will get a 3.25% pay rise, but ministers plan to defer rolling out new pay bands as part of a review of salaries among the upper echelons of the Civil Service.
