NURSES feel “deeply undervalued” and will be balloted for strike action if the government doesn’t improve on its 3.6 per cent pay offer this summer, the Royal College of Nursing has warned.

More than nine in 10 members have rejected the offer for 2025/26 in England on a 56 per cent turnout, said the union.

Its warning comes a day after resident doctors ended a five-day walkout in England over pay. The strike ballot by their union, the British Medical Association, runs until January.

RCN general secretary and chief executive Professor Nicola Ranger said: “My profession feels deeply undervalued and that is why record numbers are telling the government to wake up, sense the urgency here and do what’s right.

“Record numbers have delivered this verdict on a broken system that holds back nursing pay and careers and hampers the NHS.

“As a safety-critical profession, keeping hold of experienced nursing staff is fundamentally a safety issue.

“Long-overdue reforms to nursing career progression and the NHS pay structure aren’t just about fairness and equity but are critical for patient safety.

“To avoid formal escalation, the government must be true to its word and negotiate on reforms of the outdated pay structure which traps nursing staff at the same band their entire career.”

Nurses in Wales and Northern Ireland were consulted on the same pay award and voted to reject it, said the RCN.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “After receiving two above-inflation pay rises from this government, new full-time nurses will earn £30,000 in basic pay for the first time this year, so it’s disappointing that RCN members are dissatisfied with this year’s pay rise.

“This government is clear we can’t move any further on headline pay but will work with the RCN to improve their major concerns, including pay structure reform, concerns on career progression and wider working conditions.”

Nurses staged unprecedented industrial action over pay in 2022 and 2023.

In June 2023, the threat of more strikes ended because a ballot on further walkouts failed to meet the legal threshold of 50 per cent. Labour had pledged to remove the 50 per cent threshold, introduced by the Conservatives in 2016, but now says it will be kept in place until after a review into electronic balloting.