Consultants end strike action after accepting £20k pay rise

NHS consultants will end their strike action after accepting a new pay deal worth up to £20,000 a year.

Senior NHS doctors have voted 83 per cent in favour of the improved offer after the first deal put to its members was narrowly defeated earlier this year.

The British Medical Association (BMA) had paused strikes while talks took place after an initial pay offer was rejected by 51 per cent in January.

Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister, hailed the resolution as “excellent news for patients”.

He added: “It will mean we can continue making progress towards our goal of cutting waiting lists, which have now fallen for the fourth month in a row.

“Consultants perform a vital role at the heart of the NHS. I’m pleased they’ve accepted this deal, which is fair for them and fair for the taxpayer.”

As with the original offer, the pay deal will increase the most junior consultants’ salary to £99,532 per year, up £11,000 on the start of 2024, including a 6 per cent pay rise that has already been awarded.

It will also mean the most experienced senior consultants get a pay rise that takes their base NHS salaries to nearly £132,000, up by between £12,800 and £19,400 on the start of 2024, bringing more of them in line with the top pay point.

The improved offer secured the support of more consultants by offering those in middle bands, with between four and seven years’ experience, a pay rise of £3,000, or 2.85 per cent, on top of the 6 per cent already awarded.

Consultants also earn tens of thousands of pounds more when including overtime, private work and lucrative

NHS pensions. NHS data for 2022 showed that they earned £128,000 each on average, with a dozen taking home more than £350,000 a year and one person in excess of half a million.

Almost one in 10 consultants were taking home more than £165,000 – the amount that Mr Sunak earns.

The doctors also pay into a pension pot – with large contributions from the state – that pays out a lifetime allowance worth just over £1 million.

The BMA said 62 per cent, or 22,700, of its consultants took part in the vote, with 83 per cent voting for the new deal. There are around 60,000 consultants working in England who will all be eligible for the pay rise.

Junior doctors remain in dispute with the government as they seek a pay rise worth up to 35 per cent a year.

The BMA’s junior doctors’ committee secured a new mandate to continue striking until September.