Debate contribution: Public-sector Pay

Debate contribution by Mr Alan Chambers on 4 March 2024.

MLA

Mr Alan Chambers

Party at the time

Ulster Unionist Party

Date

4 March 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Public-sector Pay

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4254694

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Over recent weeks, a lot has been said in the Chamber and on the airwaves about public-sector pay. The debate will likely replicate much of that. Thankfully, in recent days and weeks, real progress has been made on resolving many of the public-sector pay disputes, and many unions are consulting their memberships on the respective offers on the table. I hope that those offers will begin to be accepted very soon. While we await the outcome of those processes, it goes without saying that the almost two-year absence of this place, from March 2022 to February this year, inflicted real damage. No public service escaped unscathed. Among the people most greatly impacted were so many of our public-sector workers. Given that medical staff in Northern Ireland are signed up to the wider UK terms and conditions of the NHS, my party's long-standing position has been that when the independent pay review body recommends a percentage increase, it should be implemented — no ifs, no buts. It is a simple matter of fairness. Yet, regardless of whether individual pay awards were based on the recommendation of pay review bodies or the internal deliberations of individual sponsor Departments, very little was possible in the absence of an Executive, as we all came to see. In particular, it was an absolute travesty that, once again, our health workers felt that they had no choice but to take industrial action. It is simply not in the DNA of our valued HSC staff to cause any disruption to those whom they serve. We all remember what happened in late 2019 and early 2020, with what were, then, wholly unprecedented scenes of widespread industrial action. Equally, we remember how, after the restoration of the Executive in January of that year, Robin Swann secured political unanimity around the Executive table not only to restore pay parity but to maintain it. For a while, it appeared that things were going well. Pay awards were being honoured and, when finances permitted, our health workers were even awarded additional in-year uplifts over and above what some colleagues elsewhere received. Then, barely two years after that restoration, the Executive once again collapsed and public services were pushed to the brink. The collapse in February 2022 came about only weeks before the Executive and the Assembly should have been agreeing a Budget with future allocations. That made it even worse. Instead of Departments having financial certainty and the scope to deliver on even the most important of the independent pay review recommendations, the ability to decide on anything was robbed from them. I appreciate that there may be a difference of opinion as to the rights and wrongs of holding the people of Northern Ireland to political ransom, but I am categorically in the group that thinks that the pain and disruption inflicted was far too high a price to pay. The animosity felt by our public-sector workers boiled over into record levels of action. While for many pay has, thankfully, been resolved, the implications of the disruption will be felt for some time yet. That is particularly so in the health service, with not just cancelled consultations or procedures but the loss of so much precious capacity meaning that so many fewer appointments are even booked. I appeal to the workforces that are still holding out for a revised pay award.

In particular, following my focus on health, I appeal to our junior doctors to think again about their actions later this week.

The Health Minister has already said that he has instructed his officials to deliver the DDRB recommendations. For junior doctors, that means an average pay increase of over 9%, with first-year doctors receiving a consolidated increase that is closer to 11%. Although I know that some are sticking by their ask of 35%, we just need to be realistic. There is not an unlimited pool of money, and all Ministers have had to live within the funding realities of what has been made available. There is no doubt that political uncertainty has had a damaging impact on our public services, but, instead of further action, now is the time to try to repair the immeasurable damage that uncertainty —

— has inflicted.

704 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not qualifying

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 09:43 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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