NHS nurses in Scotland are in for a pay rise after trade unions accepted an offer today.
Almost 170,000 nurses and healthcare workers for NHS Scotland will receive a 5.5% salary increase this year.
Unions representing NHS Agenda for Change staff – which includes nurses, midwives, paramedics, allied health professionals, porters and others – unanimously agreed to an investment of more than £448 million for improved pay conditions.
The pay rise will also be backdated to the start of the tax year on April 1, and nurses will see there pay increased from next month.
Scottish Health Secretary Neil Gray said the workers are the ‘backbone’ of the health service and welcomed the accepted offer.
He said: “I am pleased that trade unions have unanimously agreed to accept this pay offer, which ensures that nurses and healthcare staff in Scotland, who are part of Agenda for Change, will have the best reward package in the UK.
“I want to express my thanks again to Scotland’s hardworking healthcare staff for the care they provide to patients, day in, day out. They are the very backbone of the NHS and we are committed to ensuring they feel supported and valued.”
Under the new offer, workers on band 1 such as porters will see their pay increased by £1,278 per annum, making the hourly rate £12.71. Workers on band 2 will see a rise between £1,285 and £1,395.
Higher-earning workers including experienced staff nurses and paramedics will see their pay increased by £2,535.
In some cases, workers in band 9 who earn between £111,595 and £116,428 per year will also receive the increase bringing the salaries up to £117,732 and £122,831 per year respectively – the equivalent of £61 and £63.67 per hour.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel