In England 42% of nurses are on salaries ranging between £27,055 and £32,934. This is including newly qualified staff members, as well as some more experienced ones. The government says the average pay for nurses and health visitors is £34,275, yet could be anywhere up to £37,000.
While Rishi Sunak denies to "categorically" rule out the idea of pay increases for nurses and health workers, the government also branded a 19% pay rise "unaffordable". 19% would put the average NHS nurse and health workers pay at around £44,030.
While this may seem unaffordable to the government, members of parliament are sitting pretty on £84,144 a year, which is due to be increased to £86,584. Despite all actions throughout the coronavirus pandemic and the continued below standard conditions that NHS workers must endure, the government still believes they deserve more money.
Are they are deserving of this money as they seem to think?
Boris Johnson has recently received a £2.5 million advancement for his speeches as Prime Minister, putting his whole earnings since leaving office at more than £5 million.
It was recently discovered that Baroness Michelle Mone of Mayfair is a member of the House of Lords. During the first wave of COVID-19, Michelle Mone made millions of pounds from useless PPE that was supposed to be suppled to NHS hospitals across England.
In May 2020 Michelle Mone got in contact with Michael Gove, who at the time was a senior minister in the cabinet office, offering to supply personal protective equipment to the NHS. Gove recommended she got in contact with Theodore Agnew, a Tory peer who also worked in the cabinet office. Exchanges then began on private email addresses, meaning the public could not see their conversations. Mone told fellow Conservative politicians that large amounts of PPE could be supplied from her team in Hong Kong. This deal was fast-tracked over other PPE business offers from well placed figures. Her company, MedPro, didnt even exist at this point. Once it was set up the government created a deal of £203 million of tax payers money to go to MedPro, in exchange for 210 million masks and 25 million surgical gowns. When it came down to the actual product the 25 million gowns were denied by the Department of Health and were never actually used. The money was now being kept in offshore tax havens in the Isle of Man. Mone denied being any part of the company and claimed she "did not benefit financially" from the contract. It was found that £65 million in profits from MedPro were transferred to a trust in the Isle of Man under Mone's husbands name. £29 million were also transferred to a trust in the Isle of Man under Baroness Michelle Mone of Mayfair's account and her children. Which she most likely spent on her brand new luxury yacht parked in a marina just south of Barcelona, No government action has ever happened, and in fact the government refuses to state what it knows about the whole affair.
