Consultants re-enter pay dispute
BMA’s Northern Ireland consultants committee (NICC) made the decision to re-enter a dispute with the Department of Health last year and, following this years 3.5% award we will now be consulting members on our next steps.
Consultants are clear that patience has been exhausted and that stronger action is now required to secure fair pay and protect the future of patient care.
How we got here
For years, consultants here have been working harder and longer, with more complex cases in a much more challenging environment, whilst a crisis built in the health service. Despite the significant additional pressures, since 2008/09 our basic pay has experienced real terms (RPI) pay cut of 28.8%.
Coupled with this has been a sustained period of political instability in Northern Ireland which has meant decisions to address workforce gaps, and stabilising and transforming the health service have not been taken, adding to the pressures doctors face.
The actual application of the pay award in Northern Ireland has consistently been extremely slow; this year it took nearly a full year to be paid. This is unacceptable and out-with what happens in the other nations, it also has serious pension tax implications for many consultants.
Colleagues in the Republic of Ireland under the new Sláintecare contract are paid much higher rates than we are in Northern Ireland, which has prompted many colleagues to choose to work across the border.
In June 2024 consultants in Northern Ireland voted overwhelmingly in favour of taking strike action over pay. The strength of this vote and subsequent planned strike action brought the Department of Health to the negotiating table. Northern Ireland consultants committee secured a pay offer that was accepted by members in a referendum in August 2024. Part of this deal was the withdrawal of the consultants rate card.
The DDRB recommendation for 2025/26 of a 4% uplift did not align with our aim of full pay restoration. We informed the Department and Minister of our dissatisfaction with the award and advised we would re-enter dispute. This year's award of 3.5% is a further blow to our aims of full pay restoration.
As part of our ongoing dispute we have reintroduced the consultant rate card. we would strongly encourage you to ask for those rates for any work you undertake outside of your programmed activities. We will also be coming out to hospitals and running online events to share more information on the rate card and our pay dispute.
View the consultant rate card for Northern Ireland
Pay activists
- Help build a team at your workplace that drives our campaign locally.
- Share your ideas to help BMA Northern Ireland develop our campaign.
- Recruit new BMA members to strengthen our voice calling for full pay restoration.
- Join or start local events, meetings and activities in support of the campaign.
Keep up to date with our campaign on the BMA NI X (Twitter) and Instagram accounts.
