Doctors’ pay award deal worth up to 12.8%
Consultant members of the BMA and the Hospital Consultants and Specialists Association are to be asked to vote on a pay offer for their NHS work in England.
After a month of ‘intense negotiations’ with the Government, they have been offered a complex deal giving a 4.95% investment in pay* – for this financial year – on top of the 6% pay uplift already awarded for this year.
If they vote in favour, then the changes will be applicable from January 2024 – but will be paid retrospectively in April 2024.
It makes provision for what the BMA calls much-needed changes to the consultants’ pay scale structure, which will result in fewer points at which pay increases. (See pay scale charts at the bottom of this article).
Consultants will reach the top of the pay scale five years sooner than under the current scheme.
The BMA said: ‘There will be an increase to the starting salary for a consultant and to the salary at the top of the new pay scale structure. The exact amount a consultant will receive under the offer will depend on the current stage of their career.
‘These proposals will mean that consultants will receive a minimum of 6% in 2023-24 as a result of the previously implemented pay award.
‘However, the majority of consultants will also receive an additional uplift, of up to 12.8%, depending on their pay point, and this will apply from January 2024. This is also separate to any Doctors’ and Dentists’ Review Body (DDRB) pay award for 2024-25.’
Negotiators at the BMA said the reforms will particularly:
- Benefit women who take time out for caring responsibilities and who can be disadvantaged under the current system;
- Extend rights for enhanced shared parental leave ‘and, therefore, make considerable progress at tackling the gender pay gap in medicine’.
Reform of the pay body
The offer also includes commitments to reform the DDRB, which has been criticised by many doctors’ leaders for years.
The BMA will be given a say in the selection of members and the Government has agreed to no longer including information on economic performance in its remit letters to the DDRB and remove references to the Government’s inflation targets from the DDRB’s terms of reference.
Dr Vishal Sharma
BMA consultants chairman Dr Vishal Sharma said: ‘We are pleased that after a month of intense talks and more than six months of strike action we never wanted to take, we have now got an offer we can put to members.
‘It is a huge shame that it has needed consultants to take industrial action to get the Government to this point when we called for talks many months ago.
‘The 4.95% investment and much-needed changes to the pay scale system comes after we successfully persuaded the Government to reform the punitive pension taxation laws earlier this year, and we also now have commitments to reforming the pay review process, which has been a key ask from the profession throughout our dispute.
‘Only by restoring the independence of this process can we hope to restore consultant pay over the coming years.
‘How each consultant will benefit will depend on their individual circumstances and we will be providing them with as much detail as we can, so they are able to look carefully through the details to help them decide whether to accept the offer.’
Opportunity to vote
Detailed information about the offer and how it will affect them personally are expected to be be provided to consultants shortly.
BMA members will be given the opportunity to vote upon these proposals in a referendum, which is expected to open next month and close in January 2024.
If the offer is accepted, the BMA said it had agreed to call an end to strike action and to stop promoting the extra-contractual rate card for consultants in England.
But it added that a re-ballot on industrial action remains open and, if passed, would enable consultants to call further strikes in 2024 if the offer is rejected.
*1.5% of this will be recycled funding as a result of not issuing new Local Clinical Excellence Awards. Those with existing awards will keep them.
