Scots NHS Workers Warn Of Strike

The prospect of strike action has been raised by health workers in Scotland despite the offer of a better pay rise than their English counterparts.

Unison said a 2.5% pay rise “imposed” on them by the Scottish Executive was an insult to low-paid workers.

UK ministers have agreed to re-open talks with unions to avert industrial action in England.

Scottish union officers have written to Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon urging her to get involved in UK negotiations.

At a meeting on Tuesday in Glasgow, delegates representing 60,000 workers in Scotland, voted to support a UK ballot for industrial action.

The Scottish pay deal, which will affect about 140,000 staff, was confirmed by Ms Sturgeon last month.

The rise, which was originally agreed by the previous administration, is to take effect from July and will be backdated from April.

The settlement is to be paid in full, rather than the staged increase, which was recommended by Chancellor Gordon Brown for health workers in England.

However, Unison said an agreement by new UK Health Secretary Alan Johnson to reopen pay talks had given the executive an opportunity to argue for a better deal for the low-paid.

Tom Waterson, chairman of the union’s Scottish health group, said unions had been angered by Ms Sturgeon’s decision to press ahead with the 2.5% deal.

“Problems of low pay are identified and acknowledged in the NHS, but this settlement does nothing to address this,” he said.

He warned that the union had moved “significantly closer” to a programme of industrial action across NHS Scotland and throughout the UK.