Responding to the government’s evidence submitted to the NHS Pay Review Body (PRB), RCN General Secretary and Chief Executive Professor Nicola Ranger, said: 

“Three months after we rejected a higher amount, and with inflation rising, the government risks insulting NHS staff all over again. With too many leaving nursing and too few joining, we need urgent and fundamental pay reform, not derisory pay deals that fail to cover living costs.

“All NHS unions have asked for this autumn’s negotiations to deal with pay in a meaningful way. That cannot wait.

“There needs to be a reality check in government that you cannot transform the NHS without getting behind the workforce delivering the vast majority of care. Nursing is a highly autonomous, highly skilled and safety-critical profession but we are weighted to the bottom of the NHS pay scale with rarely a hope in progressing - sorting this must be an urgent priority for ministers.

“The pay review body process has become a sham. Unions are refusing to engage with it, and the government cannot hide behind it. We need direct talks at pace to transform nursing pay and health and care services.”