Health secretary faces NHS backlash over proposed pension changes for doctors

NHS managers say reforms to keep doctors' tax bills down should apply to them too

The PM visits a hospital in Boston (AP)

Health secretary Matt Hancock is facing a backlash from senior NHS figures who say proposed pension changes for doctors are unfair to them.

One hospital trust chief executive said he felt like a “second class NHS citizen” because of the exclusion of managers from the reform announced on Wednesday.

Mr Hancock and chancellor Sajid Javid have announced an overhaul of pension rules to allow top doctors and surgeons to treat more patients without losing out financially.

Clinicians have been refusing to work beyond planned hours because of new rules introduced in 2016 meant that overtime pay was clawed back in tax.

The new rules will allow NHS employees to scale down pension contributions without losing employer contributions. And the Department of Health and Social Care is to consult on proposed “flexibilities” to the pension scheme to ensure that from the next financial year, frontline staff can remain in it without fear of financial penalty.

Health service union Unison warned that the move would help only a small proportion of NHS staff and “looks alarmingly like the beginning of a ‘clinicians-first’ approach to pension strategy”.

And, in comments highlighted by the Health Service Journal, senior managers complained that the pension changes will apply only to senior clinical staff.

Mark Brandreth, chief executive of the Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital in Oswestry, said: “I have never felt like more of a second-class NHS citizen. An employee of 26 years treated disrespectfully by our political class … What about a doctor no longer working clinically who is in a senior management role?”

Executive director of workforce at the University Hospitals of Derby and Burton, Neil Pease, said: “Any reforms must apply to all staff not just one group. I’m sure medical colleagues and the British Medical Association would equally not want such a division.”

The chief nurse at Homerton Hospital NHS Trust, Catherine Pelley, said: “The pension issue is not just a doctor issue. This is affecting senior nurses and many managers supporting their medical colleagues.

“Only solving the issue for one part of the NHS is divisive.”

Doctor and patient taking notes in medical surgery (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Radiologist David Little tweeted that “the changes absolutely must not be limited to ‘senior clinicians’ – must be same for all”, while consultant orthopaedic surgeon Stephen Duckett said: “Crazy and unjust. Need to treat clinical and non clinical senior staff equitably.”

A DoHSC spokesman confirmed that proposed pension changes would benefit only clinical staff, but said that other senior NHS employees would be covered by a Treasury review of tapered annual allowances.

Unison’s head of health Sara Gorton said: “These changes are just fixes to resolve unworkable parts of George Osborne’s taxation regime.

“Introducing measures to help only a small proportion of the millions of active NHS scheme members looks alarmingly like the beginning of a ‘clinicians-first’ approach to pension strategy.

“At the other end of the pay scale, thousands of low-paid staff leave the scheme because they struggle to afford the payments. The government should also be paying similar attention to this problem and introducing flexibility to give staff on far lower earnings a more comfortable retirement.”