Tag: Royal College of Nursing

The High Court has ruled that the next nurses’ strike is unconstitutional

A High Court judge has ruled that the Royal College of Nursing‘s proposed strike action for next month would be illegal.

Health Secretary Steve Barclay announced last week that he will file a lawsuit against the suggested strikes.

Over the May bank holiday, RCN members who work in the NHS in England are getting ready to go on a 48-hour strike.

They plan to leave starting at 8 p.m. on April 30 (the start of the night shift) and remaining until 8 p.m. on May 3 (the start of the night shift).

The nurses appeared outside the High Court this morning (Picture: Getty)

However action on May 2 will now no longer go ahead.

The action will see nurses in emergency departments, intensive care and cancer wards down tools for the first time.

But the Government said the action on May 2 would be outside of the union’s mandate as its ballot closed at midday on November 2.

A High Court judge has now ruled the planned strike action on May 2 as ‘unlawful’ as it falls beyond its legal mandate.

Appearing before the High Court on Thursday lawyers acting for the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) argued the upcoming strike by the RCN had no ‘democratic legitimacy’ and risked harming patients, carers and the public.

Andrew Burns KC, acting on behalf of the DHSC, said that Pat Cullen had not been honest with its members over the legitimacy of the nurse’s strike.

Nurses on strike outside of St Thomas’ Hospital earlier this month(Picture: Tejas Sandhu/SOPA Images/Shutterstock)

Mr Burns told the court: ‘The Secretary of State is very concerned that the RCN has not come clean with its members.

‘The Secretary of State is very worried that this position puts nurses in an invidious position.

‘The RCN has been incompetent in looking at its calendar’.

Steve Barclay wrote to Ms Cullen on Wednesday questioning why the union had decided not to send lawyers to the hearing.

Mr Burns said that the RCN’s decision not to appear came after several hours of silence yesterday and that it appeared they were in a state of ‘some internal paralysis.’

The Health Secretary took the RCN to the High Court for a ruling over the latest round of strike action (Picture: Tayfun Salci/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock)

He said the group was trying to ‘work out how to get themselves out of the hole they had got themselves in’.

He continued: ‘Industrial action must have the support of a democratic mandate.

‘As far as the Secretary of State is concerned this is an open and shut case.’

Addressing Ms Cullen’s witness statement provided to the court, Mr Burns said: ‘The strike is outside the democratic mandate by one day and Pat Cullen should accept that’.

In a letter sent to the court the union said its decision not to send representatives was ‘in no sense … intended to demonstrate any disrespect’ to the judge or the court.

The letter read: ‘The RCN has been a staunch critic of the ideologically driven changes introduced by the Trade Union Act 2016.

‘Given the existence of an overwhelming mandate from its members in support of the action, the fact that not a single employer has intimated a challenge to the planned action on 2 May 2023 and the steadfast public support for nurses taking action, the RCN does not wish to give credence to what it fervently believes to be an unnecessary and misguided application brought by the Secretary of State, and one which is exclusively based upon one of the very many amendments introduced by the Trade Union Act 2016.’

NHS bosses wrote to Health Secretary Steve Barclay asking him to check the legality of the strike action, before the mandate expires in May.

In a statement released on Twitter, Mr Barclay said he had ‘no choice but to proceed with legal action’ against the Royal College of Nursing.

He said: ‘Following a request from NHS Employers I am regretfully applying to the High Court to declare the Royal College of Nursing’s planned strike action on May 2 unlawful.

‘Despite attempts by my officials to resolve the situation with the RCN over the weekend, I have been left with no choice but to proceed with legal action.

‘I firmly support the right to take industrial action within the law – but the government cannot stand by and let unlawful strike action go ahead nor ignore the request of NHS Employers.

‘We must also protect nurses by ensuring they are not asked to take part in an unlawful strike.’

April 27, 2023
NHS unions disagree with the government’s salary offer

The government’s 5% salary accord has caused a rift in the healthcare unions.

The government pay offer was overwhelmingly approved this afternoon by nurses, ambulance crews, and other Unison-represented NHS employees.

However, the same agreement was rejected by the nurses’ union, the Royal College of Nursing.

This implies that RCN nurses will organize a 48-hour walkout that will for the first time involve workers in emergency rooms, intensive care units, and cancer care.

From April 30 at 8 p.m. until May 2, at 8 p.m., there will be a 24-hour shutdown.

The government’s 5% wage deal and a one-off cash payment amid the cost-of-living crisis were torn in two by members, with 54% opposing and 46% voting in favour at the ballot today.

Unison said healthcare workers ‘clearly wanted more’ but pay talks could only go so far (Picture: PA)

The turnout among RCN members with NHS Agenda for Change contracts, the service’s grading and pay system, was 61%.

The union will hold another vote six months down the line to decide whether another wave of job action is needed.

In the meantime, RCN leader Pat Cullen has written to health secretary Steve Barclay urging him to return to the negotiating table.

‘What has been offered to date is simply not enough,’ she wrote.

‘The government needs to increase what has already been offered and we will be highly critical of any move to reduce it.’

With the NHS creaking at the seams, Cullen said only ‘significant action’ will address the ‘crisis’ gripping the health service.

‘After a historic vote to strike,’ she added, ‘our members expect a historic pay award.’

Unison, however, confirmed that members voted to accept the deal that includes a 5% pay rise for this year worth at least £1,065.

Unison members, including 999 call handlers, midwives, cleaners and security, will also pocket a bonus one-off cash payment of 2% for last year.

This lump sum could be between £1,655 and £3,789 depending on the pay band.

This is all on top of the £1,400 NHS staff received for 2022/23 last September.

The turnout was 52% among Unison’s 288,000 members up and down England, with 74% backing the deal that settles the months-long dispute.

Unison health head Sara Gorton said: ‘Clearly health workers would have wanted more, but this was the best that could be achieved through negotiation.

‘Over the past few weeks, health workers have weighed up what’s on offer. They’ve opted for the certainty of getting the extra cash in their pockets soon.’

Nurses, ambulance staffers and other NHS workers have braved bitter winter weather to picket for a pay increase and better working conditions.

They say that both will make working at the NHS more attractive and help ease chronic staff shortages exacerbated by a decade of Tory government cuts.

The cost-of-living crisis – which has seen inflation swell to double-digits for months – has only added to NHS workers’ already long list of woes.

Unison members backing the deal will likely bring an end to ambulance strikes taking place in London, as all the capital city’s paramedics belong to the union.

‘Lessons must also be learned. The mistakes of the past few months cannot be repeated,’ added Gorton.

‘It’s time for a whole new approach to setting pay across the NHS.’

April 14, 2023
Junior doctors call a four-day walkout after nurses accept a salary agreement

The British Medical Association has confirmed that junior doctors will once again go on four days of strike action in the next month.

After requesting a 35% wage hike, thousands of junior physicians went on strike earlier this month.

Health Secretary Steve Barclay, who met with BMA leaders yesterday, claimed the wage claim is “unaffordable.”

On April 11 and April 15, they will be on strike.

A agreement supported by unions and offered to other NHS employees includes a 5% salary increase in April and a one-time payment of at least £1,655.

This is in addition to the raise in wages they received last year of 4.75%.

Nurses, ambulance staff, physios and other workers are being asked to vote on whether to accept that deal.

Steve Barclay said doctors are asking for an ‘unaffordable’ pay rise (Picture: Loredana Sangiuliano/SOPA Images/Shutterstock)

The three biggest health unions – the Royal College of Nursing, Unison and the GMB – have all recommended their members accept it.

But the BMA has insisted only a 35% increase will do to make up for 15 years of below-inflation rises.

Dr Robert Laurenson, who co-chairs the BMA’s junior doctor committee, said: ‘It is with disappointment and great frustration that we must announce this new industrial action.

‘The government has dragged its feet at every opportunity.

‘It has not presented any credible offer and is refusing to accept that there is any case for pay restoration, describing our central ask as ‘unrealistic’ and ‘unreasonable’.

March 24, 2023
Ambulance workers announces a new round of strike in March

On February 10, 2023, in London, United Kingdom, British ambulance drivers and emergency medical staff join the wave of strikes in the UK for the fourth time.

Next month, a number of healthcare professionals, including ambulance drivers, will strike once more over salary.

The largest trade union in the UK, Unison, has declared that on March 8 in England, its NH members will join picket lines.

‘We want to see the colour of their money!’

Healthcare unions say the industrial action is the culmination of years of low wage growth, staff shortages and government underfunding

McAnea’s remark appeared to reference the Royal College of Nursing (RCN), the nurses union, which agreed to call off job action after the government agreed to long-sought pay talks.

Unison said healthcare assistants, cleaners, porters and ambulance staff will be involved in the March 8 strike.

Workers at NHS Blood and Transplant, Great Ormond Street Hospital, the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, Liverpool Women’s Hospital and the Bridgewater Community Trust will walk out for the first time.

Four other services in England – South Central, East of England, West Midlands and East Midlands – will also stage stoppages following a vote last week.

London, Yorkshire, the North East, North West and South West services – which have already taken job action four times – will strike once again on March 8.

McAnea added in a statement: ‘Unfortunately for patients, staff and anyone that cares about the NHS, the strikes go on.

Health Secretary Steve Barclay, following months of dodging, agreed to chat with the nurses union this week

‘There can be no pick-and-mix solution. NHS workers in five unions are involved in strike action over pay, staffing and patient care.

‘Choosing to speak to one union and not others won’t stop the strikes and could make a bad situation much worse.’

McAnea said the government refusing talks with Unison will ‘condemn patients to many more months of disruption’.

‘Governments elsewhere in the UK know how pay deals can be done,’ she added.

‘Rishi Sunak must copy their example, hold proper pay talks and allow everyone to get back to work.”

Ambulance workers have raised alarms about record delays for patients seeking emergency A, such as hour-long ambulance arrival and drop-off times.

The RCN called off some job action after the government agreed to pay talks

Unite said yesterday Welsh ambulance staff will walk out for two more days in March with ‘no end in sight’ to the dispute.

The stoppages, set for March 6-10, come on top of emergency services strikes up and down Britain every day this week.

Unions representing ambulance workers rejected the government’s last pay offer of 3% for 2022-23, which was on top of the average 4.5% increase paid to health workers last autumn

But unions said this figure barely keeps up with double-digit inflation and amounts to a cut in real terms.

Inflation has soared to as much as 11.1% in recent months, driving the cost of food, fuel and more to astronomical levels.

Several other unions representing healthcare workers have been locking arms with them, who see the issues facing emergency services as worsened by years-long problems within the NHS.

Up to 15,000 Unison ambulance workers went on strike last month and were joined by 5,000 of their NHS colleagues at two Liverpool hospital trusts.

Health workers such as junior doctors and nurses say the high level of staff turnaround has led to backlogs, long waits and burnt-out staff.

Ever-rising demand hasn’t helped, health unions say, neither has years of austerity measures by Conservative governments gutting public services.

February 23, 2023
Nurses calls off strike as Government agrees to pay talks

On a picket line outside St. Thomas Hospital on February 6, 2023, NHS nurses from the Royal College of Nursing in London, United Kingdom, demand safe staffing levels, just pay, and favourable working conditions.
When a record number of healthcare workers walk out in support of today’s strike, which will be the largest industrial action by that group, pressure is being added to the National Health Service at a time when it already faces many challenges.

The Royal College of Nursing’s NHS nurses were scheduled to go on three days of strike action due to their subpar pay and deteriorating working conditions.

It would have involved nursing staff working in emergency departments, intensive care units, cancer care and other services previously excluded.

But after weeks of dodging talks, the RCN and healthcare officials said the government has agreed to ‘enter a process of intensive talks’.

Union bosses will meet with meet Health Secretary Steve Barclay tomorrow to hash out a ‘fair and reasonable settlement’.

A joint statement from the RCN and the Department of Health and Social Care today said: ‘The Government and Royal College of Nursing have agreed to enter a process of intensive talks.

‘Both sides are committed to finding a fair and reasonable settlement that recognises the vital role that nurses and nursing play in the National Health Service and the wider economic pressures facing the United Kingdom and the Prime Minister’s priority to halve inflation.

Nurses resorted to job action for the first time ever last year (Picture: Vuk Valcic/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock)

‘The talks will focus on pay, terms and conditions, and productivity-enhancing reforms.

‘The Health Secretary will meet with the Royal College of Nursing on Wednesday to begin talks. The Royal College of Nursing will pause strike action during these talks.’

It is a major breakthrough in the months-long scuffle between the union and the government, with the RCN chief Pat Cullen having claimed last week there had been ‘no communication’ with Barclay during the past month.

For the first time in the 74-year history of the NHS, nurses went on strike last December amid ballooning inflation, staff shortages and a growing backlog.

The NHS, an institution deeply revered by the British public and politicians, is creaking at the seams, union members say.

The earnings of an experienced nurse have fallen in real terms by at least 20% since 2010 in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, the RCN found.

So nurses up and down the UK joined picket lines demanding a pay rise of 19%.

The increase is above the current rate of inflation but the union feels is vital after years of slow wage growth and an especially difficult cost-of-living crisis.

The NHS is creaking at the seams, union bosses say, after years of the government gutting its funding (Picture: Getty)

But the industrial action hasn’t just been about pay. Nurses hoped for better working conditions they say will help retain staff and improve patient care.

The RCN has said the NHS is at near breaking point, with several other healthcare professionals, such as ambulance workers, also resorting to strike action.

The government, however, has said such a pay rise is ‘unaffordable’.

Instead, government officials feel that pay should be determined by NHS review bodies, which set a pay increase last summer well below the union’s demand.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has insisted that he does not have a ‘magic wand’ to top up wages.

Nurses are not alone in striking, however. Doctors, rail workers, civil servants, bus drivers, barristers, refuse collectors, university academics, museum employees bottling plant staff and more have all taken to industrial action in the last few months.

February 22, 2023
10,000 ambulance workers vote to strike
Workers across the ambulance services and some NHS trusts have voted to take industrial action over the government’s 4% pay award, which the GMB has described as another “massive real-terms pay cut”.

More than 10,000 ambulance workers have voted to strike in England and Wales, the GMB union has announced.

It said: “No one in the health service takes strike action lightly – today shows just how desperate they are.”

Paramedics, emergency care assistants, call handlers and other staff are set to walk out in nine trusts:
- South West Ambulance Service
- South East Coast Ambulance Service
- North West Ambulance Service
- South Central Ambulance Service
- North East Ambulance Service
- East Midlands Ambulance Service
- West Midlands Ambulance Service
- Welsh Ambulance Service
- Yorkshire Ambulance Service
The industrial action is set to take place before Christmas, with the union planning to meet reps in the coming days to discuss potential dates.

The GMB said workers across the ambulance services and some NHS trusts have voted to strike over the government’s 4% pay award, which it described as another “massive real-terms pay cut”.

“Demoralised and downtrodden, they’ve faced 12 years of Conservative cuts to the service and their pay packets, fought on the front line of a global pandemic and now face the worst cost of living crisis in a generation.”

What other strikes are due to take place?

The strike comes after the UK’s biggest trade union, Unison, announcedthousands of its ambulance workers in England also intend to take industrial action before Christmas.

Up to 100,000 nurses from the Royal College of Nursing are also set to stage a mass walkout in December – one of the busiest months for the NHS.

Thearmy has already been placed on stand by in case it is needed to fill the roles of NHS workers while strikes are taking place.

Several strikes are also taking place across other sectors, with Eurostar security staff announcing earlier on Wednesday that they will be taking part in a walkout next month in a dispute over pay.

Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union at Network Rail and 14 train operators are striking in December and January as well.

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Source: Skynews.com
November 30, 2022
For the first time, nurses have been urged to strike over pay

For the first time in its 106-year history, the Royal College of Nursing is holding a vote among all of its members in the UK on going on strike.

The organisation is urging its 300,000 members to strike over salary; the outcome of the vote is expected next month.

If strikes go ahead, the RCN says they would affect non-urgent but not emergency care.

The government has urged nurses to “carefully consider” the impact on patients.

The RCN has been calling for a rise of 5% above the RPI inflation rate of 12%, but no UK nation has offered close to that.

In England and Wales, NHS staff, including nurses, are being given an average of 4.75% more, with extra for the lowest paid, while in Scotland, 5% has been given. In Northern Ireland, nurses are yet to receive a pay award.

The RCN said it had commissioned research showing average pay had fallen by 6% between 2011 and 2021 – once inflation had been taken into account – compared with the 4.6% average for the whole economy.

General secretary Pat Cullen told the BBC: “We’re not asking for the salaries of bankers or billionaires that seems to be the focus of this government.

“We’re just asking for a decent wage for our nursing staff so they can continue to do the brilliant job they do every day for their patients, and so that we can absolutely retain the staff that we’ve got.”

She added: “They need to give them a decent wage so they can look after their families, pay their bills.”

Speaking about how a strike would work, she added: “We will add no additional risk to the risk patients are facing every single day as a consequence of not having the right numbers and expertise of nursing staff looking after them.”

Starting salaries for nurses in England are currently just above £27,000, rising to nearly £55,000 for the most senior nurses.

The RCN said the average pay for a full-time established nurse was just above £32,000 last year – similar to average pay across the economy.

The union is inviting members of the public to co-sign a letter to Prime Minister Liz Truss, backing its stance.

IMAGE SOURCE,GETTY IMAGES Image caption, The Department of Health and Social Care in England said it valued “the hard work of NHS nurses”

The 380,000 members of Unison, including about 50,000 nurses, are also being balloted.

These ballot papers have been sent out in Scotland, with the rest of the UK following suit in the coming weeks.

Midwives in Scotland have also been balloted on strike action by the Royal College of Midwives, while the British Medical Association has said it will ballot junior doctors over industrial action.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Social Care in England pointed out the independent NHS Pay Review Body had recommended its pay award.

And it followed a 3% pay rise last year, in recognition of work during the pandemic, despite a public-sector pay freeze.

“We value the hard work of NHS nurses and are working hard to support them. Industrial action is a matter for unions and we urge them to carefully consider the potential impacts on patients,” she added.

Scottish Health Secretary Humza Yousaf said: “Any ballot for industrial action is disappointing. We are engaged with health unions and I hope we can come to an agreement on pay in the near future.”

In 2019, RCN members went on strike in Northern Ireland over pay, while nurses who are members of Unison in England walked out in 2014 over pay.

During any strike action, some nurses would continue to work to ensure emergency and urgent services continue.

October 6, 2022