Junior Doctors Strikes

b0rn2sk8 said:
But again, where is the evidence that the sick pay causes additional sickness.

Correlation doesn’t equal causation.

One thing a lot of people miss is good employers in the private sector where equivalent level professionals work also offer similar benefits. The public sector also employs considerably more disabled people as a proportion of its workforce than the private sector, this is a good thing.

It’s almost like the public sector sets the standards that the private sector should be striving to achieve.

@hager you can wear all the PPE in the world but it doesn’t fully stop the contraction of infection. In reality it’s not practical for staff to wear full PPE 24/7, as we saw in Covid it massively reduces productivity and frankly just isn’t very pleasant.

Not to mention plenty of patients are contagious before they are symptomatic.
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Quick google - https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/resource/all-is-not-well-sickness-absence-in-the-nhs-in-england NHS rate - 5.6%
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentan.../sicknessabsenceinthelabourmarket/2023and2024 - 2022 - labour market rate was 2.6%

It's twice as high and this isn't new information so not sure why you are acting like it is? Everyone knows that private v public sickness has always been different.
 
swillsy said:
Quick google - https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/resource/all-is-not-well-sickness-absence-in-the-nhs-in-england NHS rate - 5.6%
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentan.../sicknessabsenceinthelabourmarket/2023and2024 - 2022 - labour market rate was 2.6%

It's twice as high and this isn't new information so not sure why you are acting like it is? Everyone knows that private v public sickness has always been different.
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Again this isn’t evidence that better sick pay terms leads to higher sickness rates.

Correlation isn’t causation.

You ignore that good private sector employers also offer similar terms, the environment NHS employees operate in is likely to lead to higher sickness rates and public sector employers hire far more people with disabilities than the private sector.

So I’ll say it again, where is the evidence that their sick pay terms leads to higher sickness rates.
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
Again this isn’t evidence that better sick pay terms leads to higher sickness rates.

Correlation isn’t causation.

You ignore that good private sector employers also offer similar terms, the environment NHS employees operate in is likely to lead to higher sickness rates and public sector employers hire far more people with disabilities than the private sector.

So I’ll say it again, where is the evidence that their sick pay terms leads to higher sickness rates.
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I'm not sure what to say to you - the end result is what it is - you are trying to conflate the argument with good/bad emplyoers etc. It's a lot less to do with sick pay and more to do with job security in my opinion.... but again that's just based on going outside the house and talking to people who work in both public and private sectors.
 
swillsy said:
I'm not sure what to say to you - the end result is what it is - you are trying to conflate the argument with good/bad emplyoers etc. It's a lot less to do with sick pay and more to do with job security in my opinion.... but again that's just based on going outside the house and talking to people who work in both public and private sectors.
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The end result isn’t ‘what it is’ correlation does not equal causation.

The fact the two sickness rates are different (no one is disputing this) does not equate to evidence that the sick pay is the cause for the difference. That is a logical fallacy and your anecdotal opinion isn’t evidence.

You don’t know what to say because you don’t have any evidence which perfectly articulates my point.

I’m not even saying you are wrong, I’m saying you have no objective evidence for the basis of your opinion.

The question then becomes how can you form such a firm opinion on something you have no evidence of?
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
The end result isn’t ‘what it is’ correlation does not equal causation.

The fact the two sickness rates are different (no one is disputing this) does not equate to evidence that the sick pay is the cause for the difference. That is a logical fallacy and your anecdotal opinion isn’t evidence.

You don’t know what to say because you don’t have any evidence which perfectly articulates my point.

I’m not even saying you are wrong, I’m saying you have no objective evidence for the basis of your opinion.

The question then becomes how can you form such a firm opinion on something you have no evidence of?
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If you read my post I said it's probably not related to sick pay differences - which vary across both sectors and more to do with job security in public sector v private. I'm not sure what to say to you because you seem very angry about everything :)
 
Not really, the above is in a firm tone though, I agree.

However, when someone states an opinion as a fact and then can’t product the evidence to back up said opinion, and just restates the opinion as a fact, it just creates a rather circular conversation.
 
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ICDP said:
As an NHS worker from band 4 to band 8a for over 26 years, long term sick is incredibly rare and the vast majority of those that are on it have genuine mental and or physical conditions. The sick leave in my department is less than the trust average. You get the very odd abuser of the system but it is super rare and they tend to be weeded out by the system if you are a manager who stick to process.

It’s the usual daily heil reading nonsense that NHS workers regularly abuse sick leave.

I have sympathy for the junior doctors pay erosion, but it has happened to all of us in the NHS. So them asking for another 28% pay rise is basically saying “screw you” to the rest of us, because the only way it could be funded is to stop pay increases for other NHS workers. I know it will take at least 10 years to get us parity, but it has to be realistic and affordable.
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Catering to the sort of people who think common decency is wrong, but instead people should be compelled to work through health problems as a duty for their country.
 
swillsy said:
It's twice as high and this isn't new information so not sure why you are acting like it is? Everyone knows that private v public sickness has always been different.
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Gosh, who'd have thought that people working in the place all the sick people go because they're sick are more likely to get sick. Shocking!
 
PlacidCasual said:
Doctors don't care about the national finances they want their dosh and they're quite happy to sacrifice everyone else to get it.
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Imagine when the military figures out they can ask for 10x the current wages, and there is absolutely nothing anyone can do about it except to immediately meet their demands without hesitation.
 
I personally have sympathy for the doctors position, they have lost relative earning over time and elsewhere in the World they are paid better. But there is a very real fiscal crisis slowly unfolding that makes that really difficult to address. Also the way they strike is hugely harming to people who have no sway in the matter. Also we have seen the duplicitous nature of the negotiating committee in their own words, they're happy to screw the entire country to get what they want.

I broadly agree with their aim just not with their behaviour.

edit: Also I'd feel more predisposed to NHS pay demands if productivity hadn't been declining despite real terms increases in funding.
 
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swillsy said:
Quick google - https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/resource/all-is-not-well-sickness-absence-in-the-nhs-in-england NHS rate - 5.6%
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentan.../sicknessabsenceinthelabourmarket/2023and2024 - 2022 - labour market rate was 2.6%

It's twice as high and this isn't new information so not sure why you are acting like it is? Everyone knows that private v public sickness has always been different.
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I mean, if you're going to use stats for JDs at least use correct ones for JDs...

"HCHS doctors reported the lowest sickness absence rate in May 2025 at 1.8%."

digital.nhs.uk

NHS Sickness Absence Rates, May 2025 - NHS England Digital

We’re the national information and technology partner to the health and social care system using digital technology to transform the NHS and social care
digital.nhs.uk digital.nhs.uk
 
Hagar said:
Are doctors subsidising the NHS?
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Yes and have done my entire career, endless sub inflation pay rises because of financial pressures resulting in deep real terms pay cuts across medics, nurses and anyone else daft enough to work in this sector.

At some point the solution to an unaffordable health service cant be to squeeze the pay of staff endlessly. There needs to be a bigger discussion about the direction of healthcare funding.
 
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PlacidCasual said:
edit: Also I'd feel more predisposed to NHS pay demands if productivity hadn't been declining despite real terms increases in funding.
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The consensus is that there is likely no one reason or factor behind the drop in productivity in the NHS. Instead, commentary points to a number of different factors. These include the lack of investment in capital and technology which means staff are working with outdated equipment in buildings that are not fit for purpose and the NHS having a comparably low ratio of managers to overall staff, which means there is less time and expertise to think through how to streamline processes. Higher staff sickness absence rate alongside industrial action has seen increased low morale and staff burnout, while turnover rates of experienced members of staff means more newer staff who may be less familiar with processes and require more training. There are also problems with hospital flow, contributing to rising numbers of people waiting longer to be seen in A&E but also delayed discharges, while patients are also sicker and have more complex needs leading to longer length of stay in hospital. It has also been suggested by NHS England that changes to how the NHS delivers care, such as the use of virtual wards, are not fully reflected by current productivity measures. However, because of the complexity and size of the NHS, there is still little firm evidence of the relative importance of each of these factors in driving the fall in productivity.


so it seems not looking after your staff is a vicious cycle all along...whodathoughtso eh?
 
Minstadave said:
Yes and have done my entire career, endless sub inflation pay rises because of financial pressures resulting in deep real terms pay cuts across medics, nurses and anyone else daft enough to work in this sector.
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most middle income workers in the entire country have had sub inflation pay rises over the same period also.

If everyone else had inflationary pay rises, we wouldn’t have had the last 24 months talking about a cost of living crisis.
 
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