UNIONS urged Health Secretary Yvette Cooper to tackle her predecessors’ “unfinished business” today as most NHS staff feel like they receive “second-class treatment.”

Fourteen health unions representing more than 1.2 million workers said that resuming talks on NHS pay structure is essential to stop staff disillusionment over their ever-widening pay gaps with doctors and dentists.

In April this year, ministers imposed a 3.3 per cent pay increase for staff on the NHS Agenda for Change (AfC) salary scale following a pay review body recommendation.

This came with a promise to tackle problems with the wage structure and backdate any improvements in pay to April.

The wage structure has meant AfC salary awards are “consistently and significantly below those given to doctors and dentists… which does little to make health staff feel they are all part of one team,” said the unions.

But progress on this has stalled following the departure of Ms Cooper’s predecessors Wes Streeting and James Murray in quick succession, they added.

Unison head of health and chair of the NHS unions Helga Pile said: “Staff have had enough of broken promises to fix their pay. Ministers must now inject pace and serious cash into the talks so unions and employers can reach a settlement.

“A government that says it cares about efficiency and better industrial relations can’t continue to put its faith in a pay review system that belongs to a bygone era.

“There’s no sensible way to review pay in isolation from the overhaul clearly needed for the entire salary structure. That’s something even the pay review body says it’s not best-placed to do.”

Jim Fahie, Chartered Society of Physiotherapy assistant director and secretary of the NHS unions, said: “Changes to the pay structure are desperately needed and long overdue. 

“We entered into talks in good faith and it’s essential those discussions now move to a definitive outcome.”

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said that “better outcomes for patients are only possible with a supported and motivated workforce,” adding: “We are committed to working closely and constructively with unions, NHS employers and staff to tackle these challenges and have provided the NHS Staff Council with a funded mandate to negotiate improvements to the AfC pay structure.”