Midwives consider industrial action
Midwives are struggling to cope with rising birth rate
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Thursday, 24, May 2007 04:03
Midwives are considering strike action over the last pay deal offered to them.
It is the first time in the Royal College of Midwives' (RCM) 125-year history that such a move has been discussed and reflects unhappiness within the profession at pay and conditions.
Earlier this week the survey of heads of midwifery in England found that midwifery services are struggling to keep up with the rising birth rate.
Delegates at the RCM's conference in Brighton unanimously voted to ask the group's governing council to consider balloting the college's 37,000 members about industrial action, short of a strike.
Midwives have been offered a staged pay award of 2.5 per cent, but with the Retail Price Index inflation running at 4.5 per cent the RCM argues that the offer is in real terms a pay cut.
According to the RCM, under the pay deal the average midwife earning £26,702 per year will see the value of their income fall by £694 this year.
Midwives are also calling for the government to pay midwives the full 2.5 per cent award recommended by the Pay Review Body. The government decided instead to offer a staged award of 1.5 per cent from April and a further one per cent in November.
Dame Karlene Davis, RCM general secretary, said: "This overwhelming vote shows the strength of feeling about this issue. There is a groundswell of discontent amongst midwives on this issue and it is one that the government ignores at its peril.
"Morale among midwives is plummeting and the pressure on them is increasing. There is real anger at being given a staged pay deal by the government that has ignored the Pay Review Body recommendations."
Last week the Royal College of Nursing's governing council voted to ballot its members on industrial action following the refusal of the government to give nurses their 2.5 per cent pay award in full.