Nurses to be offered 2% deal on pay

COLIN BROWN

BARRIE CLEMENT and

DONALD MACINTYRE

More than 450,000 nurses are to be offered a minimum national pay rise of up to 2 per cent, with topping up by local pay deals, it emerged last night.

The news came as the Prime Minister was told that there should be a "target" pay increase of 3.5 to 4 per cent for 1,800 senior civil servants, and senior education sources predicted a settlement little higher than inflation, of between 3.2 per cent and 3.4 per cent.

The Cabinet is due to approve the inflation-breaking increases next week, in spite of Treasury anxieties that the figures proposed by the review bodies are higher than the Chancellor had hoped.

As the row over nurses' pay transferred to the chamber of the Commons, MPs' hopes of a significant salary rise were fuelled by a Cabinet decision to refer the issue to the Senior Salaries Review Board.

Tony Newton, Leader of the Commons, has opened negotiations with the Opposition over the precise timing and remit of a new inquiry into MPs' pay, pensions and allowances, which senior MPs expect to report before the general election.

Although an all-party Early Day Motion on MPs' pay sought reference to Lord Nolan's Committee, ministers were at pains to point out yesterday that unlike the Nolan committee, it is already within the remit of the SSRB to review MPs' and ministers' salaries.

Because the SSRB covers grades one to five in the civil service, the reference to it is bound to excite expectations that it could lift MPs into a new pay league by suggesting rises as high as pounds 10,000 a year.

The pay rises for nurses are part of a series of wide-ranging salary reviews for about 1.3 million public sector workers, including doctors, dentists, armed forces, senior civil servants and judges, which are due to be approved next week by the Cabinet.

Of all public servants, Whitehall mandarins will have the least idea of how the pay body's deliberations will affect them. From 1 April the top five grades will receive personal contracts and increases in remuneration will depend on promotion and performance.

The Senior Salaries Review Body has attached upper and lower limits to 11 new salary bands ordained by the Treasury and the Cabinet Office, but departments and free-standing public agencies will decide how many of their senior personnel will be in each band. They will also decide whether to apply all 11 bands.

Public sector workers were angered yesterday by the results of a study which showed that the pay rises enjoyed by NHS chief executives are running at twice the rate awarded to nurses. The survey, by Incomes Data Services, revealed that while the total earnings of the senior administrators increased by 7.6 per cent in the year to last March, nursing staff saw their average total pay rise by just 3.2 per cent.

Six chief executives received total increases in earnings of more than 20 per cent, with the highest, amounting to 29.3 per cent, at Grampian Healthcare.

The pay issue prompted angry exchanges in the Commons yesterday. Tony Blair challenged John Major during Prime Minister's Questions: "Why don't you spend the money, rather than on bureaucrats, administrators, company cars and pen-pushers, on nurses, doctors, patients and beds?"

Mr Major defended spending on NHS administration and accused the Opposition leader of asking "senseless" questions.