Thousands of British nurses to stage first strikes on Dec 15, 20

The nation is behind you. Good luck.

how about nationalizing the assets of the royal family and invest in healthcare and education?

The government says the RCN demands would cost 10 billion pounds ($12.14 billion) a year and are unaffordable.

It always surprised me how much money the government suddenly had for Covid measures which went into the billions. Not just England but ours here in Japan and many other ones. I know it was an emergency but isn't this also somewhat of an emergency? People need to eat.

Rodney.

correct.there should be no issue with that?

The Nation is most certainly NOT behind them @Rodney. You state that like you are from the UK.

I have my sympathies with them -but its another reason to keep left wing unions out of essential services.

The nation is behind you

The polling isn’t great on this from what I’ve seen, but it suggests a majority of the country support the strikes, although a majority also see what they want in terms of pay rises as excessive. What the nurses would actually accept in pay is probably another matter.

how about nationalizing the assets of the royal family and invest in healthcare and education

Nice idea but not at this moment in time as this current government cannot be trusted with money. The ineptitude and corruption over the past few years has been revolting.

Several family members were nurses but in the end, they were forced to leave over pay and conditions.

Pay for one year of experience £20,270 . Band 9 five years of experience £109,475.

https://www.nurses.co.uk/careers-hub/nursing-pay-guide/

The Royal College of Nursing estimated in 2021 that the average annual salary of an NHS nurse is £33,384. The pay rise introduced across the NHS in 2022 means that the average is probably now closer to £35,000.

https://www.nurses.co.uk/blog/a-quick-overview-of-nurses--salaries-in-the-uk-in-2022/

Is it a British nurse's strike or a strike by England and Wales NHS nurses?

Correct @Jimizo. The demands by the Union are excessive. I think we all know this would probably be resolved around 7-8% if the union started with a sensible starting point, which is hopefully where inflation will correct to in the Spring.

Since Reuters couldn't be bothered to research what the pay is for nurses, I'll do it for them. I was skeptical of the need for raises until I learned this:

Converting to US$, nurses in the UK make an average of $39,000 per year, or about $648 per week after taxes.

That's the same as a McDonald's worker in the US. A person can barely survive on that.

Average salary for government nurses in the US is over $100,000 per year.

I had no idea salaries in the UK were so low after seeing salaries for other jobs.

Salaries are terrible. My brother was a Nurse for the NHS. He left for Ireland and enjoys far better pay.

As of November 2022, the current average salary in the UK is £27,756, which is a 6.8% increase from 2021. For full-time employees, the average salary is £33,000, while part-time employees earn an average wage of £12,247 (including gig economy workers).

Average annual salary of an NHS nurse is £33,384, higher levels get more.

A person working as a Medical Administrator in United Kingdom typically earns around 79,900 GBP per year. 

And the NHS is infamous for multiple layers of administrators, managers, directors, consultants (not medical), along with diversity and inclusion managers on 70,000 GBP/year, who consume a large part of the budget.

Is it a British nurse's strike or a strike by England and Wales NHS nurses?

It seems the strike by Scottish nurses has been put on hold while a new pay offer is considered.

https://www.nursingtimes.net/news/workforce/breaking-nurse-strike-plans-paused-in-scotland-amid-new-pay-talks-18-11-2022/

I'm with you @Kniknaknokkaer: I love going back, had a great time in October, always do without fail.

Mumbairocks...

Seems like the UK is going down the toilet. I know a few brits in Tokyo, and without exception they speak poorly of their country, and I mean no exceptions. What happened to the worldwide empire?

The worldwide empire....

Chukwudubem Ifeajuna, a nurse in the south of England

It moved to the UK....

The H in NHS stands for health, sadly it is no longer a health service but an illness service. Swamped by obesity and the many health conditions brought on by this problem. A look at the pre teens will tell you that this is only going to get worse in the future.

What happened to the worldwide empire?

Most of it had become independent by around 1970. Do keep up.

Seems the NHS is not in a good state. People waiting on the street for an ambulance to arrive to take injured and collapsed people to hospitals. Pitiful waiting times even with an emergency. Patients in hospitals left in corridors because of the lack of beds and without proper care and attention.

When Boris Johnson was the PM he promised when the country left the EU, the weekly savings of £300 million would go to the NHS. It never did.

Awa no Gaijin

what is the average pay of your Swiss nurses?

Registered Nurse is CHF 95,059 (£83,000) a year and CHF 46 an hour (£40) in Zürich, Switzerland.

How many patients will die because of the strike? I guess it is the poor patients who die. It is very sad.

@MumbaiRocks!

Germany stole it's mojo and France is in bed with ze Germans. All that left is the distant memory of the empire and the Tories

English, Welsh, and Northern Ireland nurses. Not Scottish nurses who are still negotiating.

Emergency cover and ongoing treatments will continue.

Nurses can freelance as a traveling nurse in ,America make an average 100k

The NHS is understaffed.

Staffing crisis deepens in NHS England with 110,000 posts unfilled

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/mar/03/staffing-crisis-deepens-in-nhs-england-with-110000-posts-unfilled

So to strike will put lives at risk.

To suggest otherwise is nonsense.

“Hippocratic Oath”

I solemnly pledge myself before God and in the presence of this assembly, to pass my life in purity and to practice my profession faithfully. I will abstain from whatever is deleterious and mischievous, and will not take or knowingly administer any harmful drug. I will do all in my power to maintain and elevate the standard of my profession, and will hold in confidence all personal matters committed to my keeping and all family affairs coming to my knowledge in the practice of my calling. With loyalty will I endeavor to aid the physician in his work, and devote myself to the welfare of those committed to my care.

Starting pay for a nurse is less than £28,000pa. This is a Band 5 role, the majority of nurses are in this band. The government spent billions paying their mates for unusable and dangerous PPE during the pandemic, they had money for that but not to pay nurses what they are worth. There are over 40,000 registered nurse vacancies in England alone, about one in ten. In London it’s one in eight. 500 nurses a week are leaving the NHS. This can’t go on. If you think nurses are paid what they are worth then you have a very low opinion of the profession and the job.

Nurses in the UK do not take an oath, even if they did, oaths don’t pay the rent. We have bills to pay just like everyone else.

To strike in the nursing profession is playing politics with patients lives.

Operations/appointments will inevitably be canceled.

It is morally obscene to hold/blackmail the sick to account in a wage negotiation.

Luddite is correct nurses in the UK are not held to the Nightingale Pledge. Quote registered nurses are not required to take any pledge to join the NMC register

You know the most venerable will be at risk, don't suggest there isn't a risk, it is deluded to believe hospitals that have an existing staffing shortage can simply make do and muddle through.

Of course if one can afford the fees from a private hospital the strike is meaningless.

They only colonized half of the world

Nope.

Are you sure you’re from the UK, mate?

Brexit hammered NHS staffing levels.

The UK is suffering so badly from retail/energy inflation because Brexit took sterling down from $1.65 to $1.21.

Energy, tech and most foods are priced in USD. So the decline of sterling turbo charged inflation, which led to an increase in interest rates, increasing mortgage rates.

UK domestic production is declining because of poultry culls and the loss of migrant workers on farms.

This is not down to Putin or Covid. The British government broke the British economy. You can understand why Scotland want independence. If the Tories ran your country, you would too.

The Tories think they are temporarily unpopular. The truth is, they are widely hated by the British public for what they have done. Even the pro-Brexit lobby despise them for failing to deliver the 'utopia' they thought they were going to get.

The Nurses don't need to strike, instead the Population must back them up and take action to ensure that the Nurses, and Doctors who supported them during the Pandemic, are appropriately taken care of.

There will be another Pandemic, (most likely coming from one - if not all of China/Russia/Iran or North Korea). The NHS Staff are the only front line that the UK has against this, they are the ones the Public turns to for help. But where will you (the Public) be, if they have resigned because they can no longer afford to be a Medical Staffer ?