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The BMA let's us down yet again. "out of hours pay will eventually
represent 100% of the basic pay," not untill we are paid more money for
what is officially overtime compared to our basic rate, will we be fairly
reimbursed for the effect not only on our life structure but also our
health. also not untill then will any government look at reducing our
hours effectively, as they become financially unacceptable to them as they
have been unacceptable to us for many a year. no other employee or "union"
in the world would accept an hourly pay cut for out of hours work.Andrew
Hobart, when at 2am you are still working hard and you look at the porter
and realise that they are earning more than yourself, you must realise
something is gravely amiss.as for myself, i admit i am a rat that has left
the sinking ship. i am now in Australia working on a basic contract of
38hrs per week. i average 48 hrs per week in reality and every hour of
overtime is paid at x1.5. as a result the management cannot afford too
much of my overtime and they prefer to employ another doctor to also work
on the same basis and hence keeping the individual hours down. as for
emergency dept. their pay is worked on a weighting system for antisocial
hours eg. night is worth more than an evening than a day. this may not be
a perfect system, but it is a vast improvement on the U.K. present system
or that being advocated by the BMA.we are in a strong position, they need
us to work with them for the system to work. do not readily accept an
offer simply because it is better than our present appalling one. even if
you do not accept the pay benefit argument, then consider that increasing
our wage makes our overtime financially nonviable, hence our hours are
reduced and patient care is improved. we all can think of a time in the
middle of the night when you felt so tired that mental cognition was not
at it's height. as a result, our patient care level falls. that to me is
unacceptable, as it should be to all of us. Stick up for ourselves and
stick up for our patients. the public are behind us.
While this proposed new banding structure sounds interesting, could
we have some guidelines on who decides the banding of antisocial hours?
More to the the point who will enforce them, as we are all well aware of
the Trusts that refuse to acknowlege onerous rotas in the interests of
saving money?
bma let's us down again
The BMA let's us down yet again. "out of hours pay will eventually
represent 100% of the basic pay," not untill we are paid more money for
what is officially overtime compared to our basic rate, will we be fairly
reimbursed for the effect not only on our life structure but also our
health. also not untill then will any government look at reducing our
hours effectively, as they become financially unacceptable to them as they
have been unacceptable to us for many a year. no other employee or "union"
in the world would accept an hourly pay cut for out of hours work.Andrew
Hobart, when at 2am you are still working hard and you look at the porter
and realise that they are earning more than yourself, you must realise
something is gravely amiss.as for myself, i admit i am a rat that has left
the sinking ship. i am now in Australia working on a basic contract of
38hrs per week. i average 48 hrs per week in reality and every hour of
overtime is paid at x1.5. as a result the management cannot afford too
much of my overtime and they prefer to employ another doctor to also work
on the same basis and hence keeping the individual hours down. as for
emergency dept. their pay is worked on a weighting system for antisocial
hours eg. night is worth more than an evening than a day. this may not be
a perfect system, but it is a vast improvement on the U.K. present system
or that being advocated by the BMA.we are in a strong position, they need
us to work with them for the system to work. do not readily accept an
offer simply because it is better than our present appalling one. even if
you do not accept the pay benefit argument, then consider that increasing
our wage makes our overtime financially nonviable, hence our hours are
reduced and patient care is improved. we all can think of a time in the
middle of the night when you felt so tired that mental cognition was not
at it's height. as a result, our patient care level falls. that to me is
unacceptable, as it should be to all of us. Stick up for ourselves and
stick up for our patients. the public are behind us.
Competing interests: No competing interests