Hated 1% cap is finally lifted Low-paid staff get 15% boost

THERESA May was last night urged to give all public sector workers a bumper pay rise after finally striking a deal with short-changed NHS staff.

Leaders of more than a million health workers will recommend a pay offer worth 6.5% to 29% over three years. The proposed deal, thrashed out between NHS employers and 14 unions, heralds the end of the public sector pay cap.

But Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury Peter Dowd said: “Questions still remain about our wider public sector workers, who have suffered under austerity pay cuts. We must now see an end to the pay cap once and for all.”

Public sector pay was frozen for two years in 2010. Since 2013, rises have been capped at 1%. The boost for NHS workers immediately sparked calls to raise pay for troops, teachers and council staff.

TUC general secretary Frances O’grady said: “The Government must now make sure the rest of our hardworking public servants get the pay rise they have earned.”

Downing Street said officials who decide pay across the public sector had been told they no longer had to limit recommendations to 1% rises. A No 10 source said: “The independent pay review bodies will make their recommendations in the normal way. We have said as a Government that the arbitrary 1% pay cap is no longer in place.”

Under the NHS deal, confirmed by Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt yesterday, wages of the lowest-paid, such as porters and cleaners, will rise by 15%. It covers 1.3 million staff on the Agenda for Change contract. If backed Band 4 assistants and support workers get a rise from

Band 5 nurses get a rise from

Band 6 senior and community psychiatric nurses get a rise from

Band 7 specialist staff get a rise from

Band 8a scientists get an pay rise from by union members, every worker employed directly by the NHS will earn at least £8.93 an hour from April. Mr Hunt said: “NHS staff have never worked harder and this deal is recognition of that.” But the GMB union will urge members to reject the deal. National officer Kevin Brandstatter said: “Hunt’s promise of jam tomorrow is not good enough.”

Meanwhile, teachers could consider strikes unless they get a 5% rise. The National Education Union’s Kevin Courtney said there was “optimism” on the NHS deal but it fell short of teachers’ demands.

The number of EU nationals leaving the NHS in England last year rose 14% to 10,348.

ACTION HEROES Call for NHS rise on demo last month MOVE Jeremy Hunt yesterday 7,944 17.5% £20,600 to £24,200. 13,925 15,887 24.7% £24,500 to £30,600. 23.6% £30,600 to £37,900. 9,123 21.5% 6,148 £36,600 to £44,500. 18.9% £43,500 to £51,700.

FIGHT Teachers could talk strikes

HARD WORK TUC’S O’grady