Nursing support workers at six hospitals in the North East of England are due to go on strike later this week over pay.
Unison, which represents public service workers including some nursing staff, announced that hundreds of healthcare assistants (HCAs) employed by Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust will walk out to demand pay which recognises the duties they perform.
“It’s time senior managers at Northumbria stopped dithering and resolved this dispute”
Clare Williams
The chief demand driving the strike is for the workers to be elevated to a higher pay point on the NHS Agenda for Change system, in order to recognise clinical tasks they have been performing.
These tasks, according to Unison, include taking blood, performing electrocardiogram tests and inserting cannulas.
But many of the HCA’s job descriptions state that they should not be performing these tasks, said Unison, and they should instead primarily be performing personal, not clinical, care tasks.
The union claimed that senior figures at Northumbria Healthcare have “refused” to pay the staff for the work they have been performing, having accepted that it was taking place last year.
A trust spokesperson told Nursing Times that it had agreed to elevate nursing assistants at the trust from Agenda for Change band 2 to band 3, with back-pay to 1 April 2022.
Nursing Times has reached out to Unison for clarity on what its specific demands are.
Staff will walk out on strike for 48 hours starting at 7.30am on 16 July.
The action will include staff at six locations owned by the trust – Alnwick Infirmary, Berwick Infirmary, Hexham General Hospital, North Tyneside General Hospital, Wansbeck General Hospital and Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital.
Clare Williams, regional secretary for Unison in the North of England, said: “This dispute is about fairness. None of the healthcare assistants want to go on strike. They just want to be paid the money they’re owed for work they’ve done.
“Trusts up and down the country are doing the right thing and compensating their staff properly. It’s time senior managers at Northumbria stopped dithering and resolved this dispute.
“There’s no reason hardworking staff in Northumbria should have to settle for less than the thousands of other NHS employees who’ve already agreed much fairer deals,” she said.
A trust spokesperson said: “Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust worked in partnership with our local Staff Side last year and reached an agreement in principle to re-band the role of nursing assistant from band 2 to band 3 with effect from 1 April 2024, with pay back-dated to 1 April 2022.
“We acted quickly to make the banding changes and pay backpay to those who were entitled to it,” they said.
“As always, we are committed to working in partnership with our staff side colleagues on local matters, and we will do what is required to ensure the safe care of our patients.”
This pay dispute is the latest in a series of walkouts by HCAs across the country in recent years.
A national campaign organised by Unison has aimed to stamp out the under-banding of nursing support workers who have, for years, been performing clinical tasks above their pay grade.
Since 2021, the Union claimed, more than 60 English and Welsh NHS trusts have agreed to up-band HCAs and back-pay them due to this.
In 2023 and 2024, trusts across England saw back-to-back strike action over the demands as many local Unison branches struggled to obtain a back-pay deal from trusts without walkouts.
