Rishi Sunak would 'love' to pay nurses more but inflation is an issue

The prime minister addressed healthcare concerns and ongoing pay disputes at an event in Darlington on Monday, as the government announced a new £1bn investment to help cut waiting times and increase capacity. 

Mr Sunak is under growing pressure to end the wave of public sector strikes, with a fresh round of mass industrial action set to begin on Wednesday.

Up to half a million workers including teachers, train drivers and civil servants will start the walkouts before nurses and ambulance workers again walk out next week.

Mr Sunak was asked: “When are you actually going to pay nurses properly?” as he addressed an audience of health workers at Teesside University’s National Horizons Centre. 

“I would love – nothing would give me more pleasure – than to wave a magic wand and have all of you paid lots more,” he said.

Mr Sunak is under growing pressure to end the wave of public sector strikes, with a fresh round of mass industrial action set to begin on Wednesday. (Image: PA)

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But he argued it is “not an easy job” to balance many competing interests for Government funding, as he warned against further stoking inflation to bring down bills.

“I’ve got to get a grip of that for all of you, it’s the most important thing. If we don’t do that we won’t be able to afford anything in the future,” he said.

Conservative colleagues have also demanded the prime minister not to further increase taxes as he tries to hit his target of reducing soaring inflation this year by half.

He added: “Even though it makes my life a bit more difficult today I really think it is the right thing for all of you and everyone else if we just get through this.”

He argued tax hikes would also make health workers’ lives more challenging as they battle a cost-of-living crisis.

“Where we are with taxes at the moment, we can’t put them up any more, right, and we need to be getting them down,” he said.

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Wednesday will see the biggest day of industrial action in over a decade, when seven trade unions, also including university lecturers, bus drivers and security guards, walk out.

The Trades Union Congress (TUC) has warned this could see up to 500,000 workers on strike as protests are also held across the country against the Government’s controversial plans for a new law on minimum service levels during strikes.

Rishi Sunak promised that the Government’s plan for emergency care will deliver “the largest and fastest-ever improvement in emergency waiting times in the NHS’s history”.

Speaking during a visit to North Tees Hospital, Stockton, he pledged to fix ambulance delays and the crisis in A&E, though critics have said serious questions remain around the number of staff needed to improve NHS care.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak (right) with Secretary of State for Health Steve Barclay during their tour of University Hospital of North Tees (Image: PA)

The Government has set goals that by March 2024:

• 76% of A&E patients will be dealt with in four hours. Currently fewer than 70% are and the official target is 95%.
• An average response time of 30 minutes for category 2 emergency calls such as heart attacks and strokes over the course of 2023/24. In December, patients waited over 90 minutes. The official target is 18 minutes.

Mr Sunak said his plan meant there would be more beds, more ambulances, more staff and better social care and “if we can deliver on it, I think we will see – in fact I know we will see – the largest and fastest-ever improvement in emergency waiting times in the NHS’s history”.

He added: “That is the ambition of our plan that we’ve set out today … I feel really confident we can deliver it.”

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Mr Sunak said that with the “hard work” and the “ingenuity” of NHS staff “we’re going to fix this problem”.

He said: “We’re going to improve things for patients and make an enormous difference to people up and down the country.”

Asked about ambulance waiting times, he said: “Of course it’s not good enough, of course, gosh, what happened in December was not great, it was not great for any of you working in the NHS, it was not great for patients.

“We will get back to 30 minutes over the course of this year and then we will get back to pre-pandemic levels thereafter, I would say that is ambitious.”