With jaw dropping insensitivity, the government announced that NHS staff will get a 1% pay rise and all other public sector workers will get nothing. This, during a time when many public sector workers are on their knees, dealing with a mismanaged pandemic. Doctors and nurses are losing their lives to treat people with an illness they wouldn’t have if the government had closed the borders. Police are having to issue fines to people who sit down when they are outside and have to deal with a criminal underclass who have added spitting to arsenal of ways they can kill a police officer. Teachers have been asked to both work in school (for key worker and vulnerable children) and support children working at home. The bin collectors have touched a trillion bins at a time when we were all warned that surfaces could kill us. The worst thing about this announcement is that it comes as some of the government’s other spending is revealed. £200,000 was given to the Prime Minister’s wife to help with the designer refurb of their flat and £2.6 million was spent of revamping number 9 Downing Street, as a media centre, for US style media Q&A sessions.
I know those figures are no where near what would be required to give public sector staff the pay increases they deserve but it hints at a spending priority that most of us would disagree with. There aren’t many people who would decorate a kitchen when they knew there was a leaky pip that could burst at any moment.
If the government had announced that they were going to have a proper review of the NHS and make sure it was effectively funded, alongside an announcement of a 1% pay increase, that might be a different story. If they looked at why nurses are working 12/16 or even 24 hour shifts and did whatever was needed to stop that (for the safety of everyone). If they made sure each NHS trust had the PPE equipment it needed plus an ability to get more quickly and easily. If they provided more training and committed to employing more staff. If they looked into improving the health outcomes of the poorest in society. If.
There were no ifs, though. None of the problems that have caused this virus to rip through our country in a way that’s more devastating way than almost anywhere else have been addressed.
I can’t be the only one that thinks percentage pay rises are part of the problem, either.
When I was little my Dad taught me a very valuable lesson about percentages. He asked me to help him with something. I think it was decorating. Being a stroppy mare, I huffed and said, “Only if you pay me more than you did last time.”
I saw the smile play around the corners of his eyes but ignored it.
“A percentage increase?” he asked. “I’ll give you an extra 5%.”
“Ten percent!” I countered
“Done!”
I was so pleased with myself; thrilled with my negotiating skills until I realised that he hadn’t paid me anything before.
“Ten percent of nothing is still nothing!” he laughed.
Percentage pay rises make the problems worse. A care assistant earning £8an hour will get an extra £13 a month. Their bills will go up by the percentage of inflation. The chief executive of the NHS by contrast will find an extra £166 in his monthly pay packet. If they both spent £100 on their weekly shop then that extra 80p (if inflation stays as it is) hardly makes a dent in the £166 but is a huge proportion of the £13.
Clearly, I don’t have any solutions to this because I’m just a primary school music teacher who thinks too much but if all this doesn’t make you feel a little bit uncomfortable then you probably aren’t paying attention.
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