BRITAIN’S biggest union Unite is calling on private companies and the Department of Health to give indirectly employed NHS workers the same pay increase as employees.

More than a million health workers will receive a pay rise worth 6.5 per cent to most staff over the next three years.

But thousands of workers in the health service, many of them low-paid, have been excluded from the deal as they are indirectly employed, which Unite says is unjust.

Privateers are due to meet the Department of Health today to discuss pay for workers indirectly employed by the NHS.

Unite has written to employers providing services to the NHS, including Serco, ISS, Compass and Sodexo, to urge them to implement the NHS framework as a minimum.

National officer Colenzo Jarrett-Thorpe said: “Regardless of whether an NHS worker is employed by a private company or the NHS, they are still health workers and their contribution to patients’ health must be recognised.”