What is happening to public sector pay?

With inflation rising, and a cost of living crisis hitting the UK, how much public sector workers get paid is hitting the headlines.

What has their pay been like in recent years? How do public sector workers do relative to those in the private sector? And can departments afford to pay more?

[Worthers]

Public sector worker here...I got something like 2.8%, so where is this 5% coming from? Aldi staff have had about three pay rises this year to account for inflation. Let's not claim it's greedy Public sector staff causing inflation, we're trying to keep up.

[nikolarosie]

The problem within the nursing sector is the wasted money pouring into private agencies to cover the massive unfulfilled job vacancies . The type of nurse u get from the agency are more often than not familiar with the local policies of the hospital they are working in. Mainly because if u hold an NHS contract in a region u can’t take agency shifts so you need to travel to another region to work. That’s why many nurses are taking the risk and jumping ship to private agencies like The Nursing Guild. So when u reflect on cost per hour the difference between NHS staff/staff bank and private agencies is absolutely eye watering and definitely unsustainable. Agency nurses per hour are on at times three times the hourly rate of NHS experienced ward based staff member. Plus added to that hourly rate is the extra administrative and travel costs due to fact agency nurses normally travel across one or two regions to get to their shift. Most guild are only there to promote safe staffing numbers and therefore often have no access to writing notes or administrating meds. It’s simply not sustainable and I would ask everyone that reads this to ask for data information on the payroll costs. Especially for their own NHS regions nursing staff payroll figures and then to ask for the cost of outside nursing agencies at end of 22/23 financial year. Then approach your MP and ask what is happening and they will need to answer you directly on this waste and mismanagement of tax payers money.I definitely think people will be absolutely shocked at what is actually happening and how money is gets completely misspent in wages for nursing staff. And then to ask the question why can’t we afford the 15% pay increase when we are paying triple ++ the amount to agencies that we pay our NHS payroll nurses as will clearly be shown at end of year figures? And then I ask u to understand why NHS nurses are absolutely burnt out and are thinking of striking over pay and conditions.
This strike isn’t just about pay it’s about encouraging nurses back into the NHS workforce. It’s about making it a financially viable career for school leavers to want to go and study. It’s about having SAFE STAFFING numbers on our wards. A workforce that knows it’s patients and are able to provide the high standard of care that the whole NHS strives to promote.

[NessieAndrew]

Being the devil's advocate here, but won't this just fuel inflation?

[furrybear]

Do you know what our ancestors went through to het is to where we are! Here's a question on, I'm sure many minds:-how can a nurse, doc, train driver the list go on not survive without food banks? If that were true all employees would die of starvation, they have 1/5 of the money to live on!