Junior doctors' union ‘fiddling figures to justify pay strikes'

Telegraph

2 days ago

Junior doctors are better off now than they were a decade ago, an analysis has found – despite union claims that they are 22 per cent poorer.
The healthcare workers, now known as resident doctors, are asking for an almost 30 per cent pay rise on top of their 5.4 per cent raise this year, which itself comes on the back of a 22.3 per cent increase last summer.
The 5.4 per cent average increase was the largest of any public sector profession this year, including among nurses and teachers.
But the British Medical Association (BMA), which represents UK doctors, is pushing for more, balloting 55,000 members over further strikes that would cause another period of NHS disruption.
Richard Tice, the Reform UK deputy leader, accused the union of 'playing games' with taxpayers' money by cherry-picking data to justify unleashing chaos in the healthcare system.
The union claims that, in order for doctors to be as well paid as they were in 2008, they need another 28 per cent salary rise to compensate for being 22 per cent worse off on a like-for-like basis than 17 years ago.
However, the calculations that led to that assertion have been questioned, with critics claiming the BMA was disingenuously presenting the facts to squeeze as much as possible out of public funds.
Mr Tice told The Telegraph: 'Sadly, the doctors' unions never stop playing games and fiddling around with the figures. It would be nice for a change for them to have patients' care at the heart of their actions.'
In its leaflet to doctors, the BMA says: 'You are not worth 22 per cent less than doctors in 2008. Your job is not 22 per cent easier. Cost of living is not 22 per cent cheaper. We must tell the Government again.'
The figure comes from the BMA comparing current pay to 2008, following years of inflation-busting pay rises, and then measures inflation using the retail price index (RPI).
Both these decisions have been criticised. The RPI, for example, is widely ostracised by statisticians in favour of the consumer price index (CPI), which offers more moderate inflation figures.
The use of 2008 as a benchmark has also been called 'arbitrary'.
Different stats provide 'very different answers'
Analysis from the Nuffield Trust, a health think tank, showed that if the BMA were to use the CPI, as favoured by the Office for Budget Responsibility, and use 2014-2015 for a comparison, resident doctors would be better off now than a decade ago by almost 8 per cent.
The BMA has said the choice to use the RPI, which shows a much larger real-terms pay decline, is valid because it is used by the Government to calculate student loan interest rates.
Lucina Rolewicz, a Nuffield Trust researcher, said: 'You can paint a very different picture of real-terms changes to resident doctors' pay packets over time, depending on the methods you use.
'If you look at what's changed since 2008, pay erosion appears much worse than if you looked at the changes since 2015 in isolation.
'Against the CPI measure of inflation, this can make the difference of showing a 4.7 per cent fall in pay since 2008 or a 7.9 per cent increase since 2015.'
Ms Rolewicz added: 'Comparing changes to pay at the same point in time, using different measures of inflation, also results in very different answers. For instance, resident doctor pay has fallen by 4.7 per cent since 2008 against CPI but has decreased by 17.9 per cent over the same period when using RPI.
'Given the importance of the debate for doctors, their colleagues, patients and taxpayers, it is crucial that we look at all the ways that pay can be seen to have changed.'
Darwin Friend, the head of research at the TaxPayers' Alliance, said: 'Taxpayers will be shocked to learn that the BMA is pushing for further pay rises based on carefully selected inflation figures.
'Despite resident doctors agreeing a 22 per cent increase last year and receiving the largest above-inflation pay reward this year, the BMA is using inconsistent measures to demand even more.
'At a time when public services are under strain and resources are limited, it's vital that pay resolutions are grounded in fairness and economic reality.'
A BMA spokesman said: 'The BMA's campaign is based on achieving full pay restoration back to 2008, when our pay cuts began, against RPI erosion.
'Using RPI is a measure which we, in line with the wider trade union movement, believe best reflects the real-life experience of working people in the UK, and which the Government continues to use when it suits – for example, to set student loan interest rates that resident doctors are charged.
'RPI includes housing costs, which are hugely relevant to resident doctors being moved round the country on their training rotations.'