The financial situation that NHS colleagues find themselves in is extremely worrying and is adding to our struggle to recruit and retain staff. Much has been written about the impact of high tax bills faced by the higher earners in the NHS; Campbell (2019), writing in The Observer, cited findings from the Hospital Consultants and Specialists Association that due to the impact of pension taxes, more than a third (34%) of doctors have cut their hours, and 39% have turned down or given up medical leadership roles in the NHS because of their pension concerns. Worryingly, around half of those who had taken either course of action said that no other doctor had stepped in to take over their work. In the same piece, the British Medical Association warned of the effect that this is having, leaving ‘doctors trapped in a dilemma between wanting to care for patients and not wanting to end up worse off ’ (Campbell, 2019).
Although it has not received anything like the media coverage that doctors' pensions has had, the converse position of lower-paid NHS staff is also worrying. Jefferies (2019) wrote about the fears that many of this group of staff feel unable to afford the pension contributions at all, with nearly a quarter of a million active members having opted out of the scheme in the past 3 years. A Freedom of Information request found NHS workers aged 26-35 years are most likely to leave the scheme, with some 30 000 doing so in 2017 (Jeffries, 2019). The suggestion seemed to be that there is a lack of knowledge surrounding the benefits of the NHS pension scheme, and the amount paid by the employer, and that the employees on lower salaries see paying into the NHS Pension Scheme as a big expense for a benefit that is many years away.
With financial hardship becoming a very real issue for nursing staff, I feel it is important that we understand how, as senior leaders, we might signpost support for our colleagues or support them ourselves.
As highlighted by Hawker (2019), Beverley Penman, a nurse and single mother with two children, revealed her distressing story of hardship on social media by posting a picture of her dining table filled with everyday items from a food bank. In her post on Twitter she said she felt ‘demoralised’ by resorting to food banks and thought as a nurse she would never be in this position, criticising Government austerity policies.
The Cavell Nurses' Trust is one organisation that nurses can turn to for help in a financial crisis. In 2019, it published the results of a survey of 1149 respondents, and some of the worrying headlines include:
One of the key questions included in the poll asked nursing staff if their ‘financial situation’ had ever led them to ‘consider leaving nursing or midwifery’, with a striking 55% of respondents saying ‘yes’.
‘With financial hardship becoming a very real issue for nursing staff, I feel it is important that we understand how as senior leaders we might signpost support for our colleagues or support them ourselves’
The urgent review of the NHS pension currently being undertaken by the government is welcomed; there is also a need for employers to provide more education to staff on all grades about the benefits of being in the NHS pensions scheme. In addition, having reflected on this subject area, I shall be exploring how my organisation can formally join the Cavell Nurses' Trust ‘Working with’ membership programme to enable support for our staff.