UK cost-of-living crisis: Nursing union warns next strike will be doubled if pay negotiations stay stall

Double the number of England nurses will be asked to strike in early February to mount pressure on the government, union leaders have threatened as they blame Prime Minister Rishi Sunak for his approach towards pay disputes across the country's health service.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) union said that new walkouts would be announced if the negotiations over pay remain stalled by the end of January, making it the RCN's biggest strike in history. Accordingly, the next set of strikes will include all eligible members in England for the first time.

RCN general secretary Pat Cullen insisted that the public backed the nurses in their pay dispute with the government, blaming the prime minister for his “baffling, reckless and politically ill-considered” approach to the negotiations.

“The prime minister gave nursing staff a little optimism that he was beginning to move, but seven days later he appears entirely uninterested in finding a way to stop this,” Cullen said.

She added that “nursing staff just wanted to be valued and recognized. The nurse shortage costs lives – Sunak cannot put a price on a safe NHS.”

UK strikes set to continue after government officials' talks with labor unions fail to resolve payment dispute

The UK is set to witness more industrial actions by the country’s labor forces after meetings between ministers and trade unions failed to address the dispute.

The UK prime minister has been under fire for his inaction regarding the chaos across the country's healthcare system, with doctors saying the NHS is in a very precarious situation as units are struggling with demand and health trusts and ambulance services declaring critical incidents.

A Department for Health and Social Care spokesperson showed no sign of a change in approach in a statement on Saturday night, which said more than one million NHS workers had received a minimum £1,400 pay rise this year.

"We have accepted the recommendations of the independent NHS Pay Review Body in full and have given over one million NHS workers a pay rise of at least £1,400 this year. This is on top of a 3% pay increase last year when public sector pay was frozen and wider government support with the cost of living," the spokesman said.

Nursing staff from more than 50 NHS trusts in England are set to take industrial action on Wednesday and Thursday.

Moreover, the RCN has announced that the next strike is likely to be on 6 February, to coincide with the 10th anniversary of the Robert Francis inquiry into Mid Staffordshire NHS trust and the impact of nurse shortages on patient mortality.

The Robert Francis inquiry, which was focused on Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust, uncovered the neglect of hundreds of patients at Stafford Hospital between 2005 and 2009, with accounts of some elderly people being left lying in their own urine, unable to eat, drink or take essential.

100,000 British civil servants to strike on February 1

Around 100,000 British civil servants have announced plans to strike on February 1, the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union has announced, in an escalation of a long-running dispute over pay and conditions.

The union initially demanded a pay rise of 19 percent, though has indicated it may accept 10 percent. Downing Street is instead considering a “one-off” payment to health workers, possibly in the form of a hardship payment to get them through this winter.

Rishi Sunak last week refused to confirm or deny if the government accepted the one-off payment but said the most important thing is that “talks are happening.”

This comes as ministers push for new anti-strike laws forcing the staff to maintain a basic level of service during strike time or face dismissal.

During the past months, the UK has been grappling with its biggest strike wave for decades, with airport baggage handlers, border staff, driving instructors, bus drivers, and postal workers walking off their jobs to demand higher pay, to be able to cope with the soaring inflation and worsening cost-of-living crisis.

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