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Confirm NHS pay rises now, RCN tells government
The Pay Review Body’s report was delivered to the UK government late last week, but details on the 2025/26 NHS pay awards still haven’t been confirmed
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Nursing staff working in the NHS in England cannot be made to wait any longer for details of their pay award, the RCN has told ministers.
The Pay Review Body (PRB)’s report was delivered to the UK government at the end of last week. The annual pay award for 2025/26 is already late, as the pay year began on 1 April.
“Nursing staff need certainty now,” said Joanne Galbraith-Marten, RCN Executive Director of Legal and Member Relations. “More dither and delay will not wash.”
Earlier this month the government announced it would not pursue plans to overhaul the NHS pay structure to improve nursing recruitment and retention, a move that the RCN said showed ministers are not “on the side of nurses”.
The previous UK government promised to explore a nursing pay spine as part of the offer negotiated in March 2023. We’ve been clear that pay reform is still desperately needed.
On 1 April, we said each day that passes without a pay award is another day the government leaves nursing staff in the dark and out of pocket. Two weeks on, we’re saying it’s time to deliver the annual pay uplift for nursing staff.
In December 2024, the UK government confirmed in its evidence to the PRB that it had only budgeted for a 2.8% uplift to staff pay. We described the figure at the time as "deeply offensive" and we’re reiterating calls for a fair pay rise. Repeated below-inflation pay awards have caused nursing pay to fall in real terms by around a quarter since 2010/11.
“Nursing staff are the key to pulling the NHS out of its current crisis and delivering the government’s reforms,” Joanne Galbraith-Marten said. “This will only happen when the profession is rewarded fairly for its work, allowing services to attract and keep experienced, highly skilled staff.”
“Our members already don’t feel valued by this government and any further delay will cause anger among those working in the NHS. With student numbers and international recruitment plummeting, the government cannot afford to kick the can down the road.”
