The Conversation (0)
Joanna Taylor
Apr 13, 2020
Boris Johnson has thanked the "unbeatable" NHS which he says saved his life as he battled Covid-19 at St Thomas's Hospital.
In a video message posted to Twitter, he named some of the nurses who cared for him, staying by his bedside for up to two days as he faced the worst of the virus.
But while the PM and his government are thanking the NHS now, people can't help but to remember a time when their gratitude wasn't quite as forthcoming...
You've probably seen references to the Tories voting against pay rises for nurses in 2017 on social media during the pandemic.
But let's take a closer look at what actually happened.
What were MPs voting on in 2017?
In 2010 the government under David Cameron and Nick Clegg froze the wages of public sector workers earning £21,000 or more for two years as part of their austerity measures. This included nurses, whose starting salary was just above the £21,000 threshold at the time.
Then from 2013, any increase to public sector workers's wages was capped at 1 per cent per year. Some people consider this essentially to be a cut, given that this was below the rate of inflation.
On 28 June 2017 MPs voted on whether or not to lift that 1 per cent cap, meaning workers including nurses might get a pay rise. And the majority voted against it.
Was the Conservative Party responsible for MPs voting against possible pay rises?
In 2017 the Conservative Party was under different leadership than it is now.
But essentially, yes. The amendment the parties were voting on was submitted by Labour and the vote was split along party lines.
The 323 MPs who successfully voted down the amendment were made up of 313 Tories and ten members of the DUP.
The 309 MPs who who voted in favour of the amendment were mostly Labour. SNP, Plaid Cymru, the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and one independent also voted in favour.
What was the reaction?
Some Conservative MPs cheered as Labour's amendment was voted down.
But it wouldn't be long before changes were made anyway.
Have MPs had a pay rise since 2017?
Pay for MPs increased by 3.1 per cent on 1 April, well above the 1.8 per cent rate of inflation by the CPI measure.
This brought their basic pay from £79,468 to £81,932.
In fact, MPs enjoyed eight pay rises throughout the 2010s, the most substantial being the jump from £67,000 to £74,000 in 2015. MPs can also claim up to £10,000 in expenses for working from home needs during the pandemic, on top of the £26,000 they can claim to cover office costs. The government have stressed that this money will be spent on equipment like laptops and printers, and is not simply a bonus for MPs.
Who voted against lifting the cap on public sector wages in 2017?
Familiar faces including Matt Hancock and Boris Johnson were amongst those who voted against the amendment.
But so did the rest of the Conservatives. With no rebellions, this seemed like more of a party decision than an individual decision. Some Conservative MPs like Andrew Murrison and Maria Caulfield did speak in favour of removing the cap, but ultimately voted on party lines.
Conservative governments were responsible for implementing and keeping in place the austerity measures that kept pay for nurses, teachers, firefighters and police officers below even the rate of inflation.
This cap was eventually lifted was largely owing to pressure on Theresa May's government from worker's unions and the Labour Party who gained 30 seats in parliament less than a month before the vote in 2017.
The full list
Current Cabinet ministers and attendees who voted are bolded.
N.B: Not everyone who was a Conservative MP in 2017 is a Conservative MP today. Some MPs like David Gauke lost their seats in the 2019 general election, whilst others like Rory Stewart are now independent.
Conservatives
Nigel Adams
Bim Afolami
Adam Afriyie
Peter Aldous
Lucy Allan
Heidi Allen
Stuart Andrew
Edward Argar
Victoria Atkins
Richard Bacon
Kemi Badenoch
Steven Baker
Harriett Baldwin
Steve Barclay
John Baron
Guto Bebb
Henry Bellingham
Richard Benyon
Sir Paul Beresford
Jake Berry
Bob Blackman
Crispin Blunt
Nick Boles
Peter Bone
Peter Bottomley
Andrew Bowie
Ben Bradley
Karen Bradley
Graham Brady
Jack Brereton
Andrew Bridgen
Steve Brine
James Brokenshire
Fiona Bruce
Robert Buckland
Alex Burghart
Conor Burns
Alistair Burt
Alun Cairns
James Cartlidge
Bill Cash
Maria Caulfield
Alex Chalk
Rehman Chishti
Christopher Chope
Jo Churchill
Greg Clark
Colin Clark
Kenneth Clarke
Simon Clarke
James Cleverly
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown
Thérèse Coffey
Damian Collins
Alberto Costa
Robert Courts
Geoffrey Cox
Stephen Crabb
Tracey Crouch
Chris Davies
David Davies
Glyn Davies
Mims Davies
Philip Davies
David Davis
Caroline Dinenage
Jonathan Djanogly
Leo Docherty
Julia Dockerill
Michelle Donelan
Nadine Dorries
Steve Double
Oliver Dowden
Jackie Doyle-Price
Richard Drax
James Duddridge
David Duguid
Alan Duncan
Iain Duncan Smith
Philip Dunne
Michael Ellis
Tobias Ellwood
Charlie Elphicke
George Eustice
Nigel Evans
David Evennett
Michael Fallon
Suella Fernandes
Mark Field
Vicky Ford
Kevin Foster
Liam Fox
Mark Francois
Lucy Frazer
George Freeman
Mike Freer
Marcus Fysh
Sir Roger Gale
Mark Garnier
David Gauke
Nusrat Ghani
Nick Gibb
Cheryl Gillan
John Glen
Zac Goldsmith
Robert Goodwill
Michael Gove
Luke Graham
Richard Graham
Helen Grant
Bill Grant
James Gray
Chris Grayling
Chris Green
Damian Green
Justine Greening
Dominic Grieve
Andrew GriffithsÂ
Sam Gyimah
Kirstene Hair
Robert Halfon
Luke Hall
Philip Hammond
Stephen Hammond
Matt Hancock
Greg Hands
Mark Harper
Richard Harrington
Rebecca Harris
Trudy Harrison
Simon Hart
John Hayes
Oliver Heald
James Heappey
Chris Heaton-Harris
Peter Heaton-Jones
Gordon Henderson
Nick Herbert
Damian Hinds
Simon Hoare
George Hollingbery
Kevin Hollinrake
Philip Hollobone
Adam Holloway
John Howell
Nigel Huddleston
Eddie Hughes
Jeremy Hunt
Nick Hurd
Alister Jack
Margot James
Sajid Javid
Ranil Jayawardena
Bernard Jenkin
Andrea Jenkyns
Robert Jenrick
Boris Johnson
Dr Caroline Johnson
Gareth Johnson
Jo Johnson
Andrew Jones
Marcus Jones
David Jones
Daniel Kawczynski
Gillian Keegan
Seema Kennedy
Stephen Kerr
Sir Greg Knight
Julian Knight
Kwasi Kwarteng
John Lamont
Mark Lancaster
Pauline Latham
Andrea Leadsom
Phillip Lee
Jeremy Lefroy
Edward Leigh
Oliver Letwin
Andrew Lewer
Brandon Lewis
Julian Lewis
Ian Liddell-Grainger
David Lidington
Jack Lopresti
Jonathan Lord
Tim Loughton
Craig Mackinlay
Rachel Maclean
Anne Main
Alan Mak
Kit Malthouse
Scott Mann
Paul Masterson
Theresa May
Paul Maynard
Patrick McLoughlin
Stephen McPartland
Esther McVey
Mark Menzies
Johnny Mercer
Huw Merriman
Stephen Metcalfe
Maria Miller
Amanda Milling
Nigel Mills
Anne Milton
Andrew Mitchell
Damien Moore
Penny Mordaunt
Nicky Morgan
Anne Marie Morris
David Morris
James Morris
Wendy Morton
David Mundell
Sheryll Murray
Andrew Murrison
Bob Neill
Sarah Newton
Caroline Nokes
Jesse Norman
Neil O'Brien
Matthew Offord​
Guy Opperman
Neil Parish
Priti Patel
Owen Paterson
Mark Pawsey
Mike Penning
John Penrose
Andrew Percy
Claire Perry
Chris Philp
Christopher Pincher
Daniel Poulter
Rebecca Pow
Victoria Prentis
Mark Prisk
Mark Pritchard
Tom Pursglove
Jeremy Quin
Will Quince
Dominic Raab
John Redwood
Jacob Rees-Mogg
Laurence Robertson
Mary Robinson
Andrew Rosindell
Douglas Ross
Lee Rowley
Amber Rudd
David Rutley
Antionette Sandbach
Paul Scully
Bob Seely
Andrew Selous
Grant Shapps
Alok Sharma
Alec Shelbrooke
Keith Simpson
Chris Skidmore
Chloe Smith
Henry Smith
Julian Smith
Royston Smith
Sir Nicholas Soames
Anna Soubry
Caroline Spelman
Mark Spencer
Andrew Stephenson
John Stevenson
Bob Stewart
Iain Stewart
Rory Stewart
Gary Streeter
Mel Stride
Graham Stuart
Julian Sturdy
Rishi Sunak
Desmond Swayne
Hugo Swire
Robert Syms
Derek Thomas
Ross Thomson
Maggie Throup
Kelly Tolhurst
Justin Tomlinson
Michael Tomlinson
Craig Tracey
David Tredinnick
Anne-Marie Trevelyan
Elizabeth Truss
Thomas Tugendhat
Ed Vaizey
Shailesh Vara
Martin Vickers
Theresa Villiers
Charles Walker
Robin Walker
Ben Wallace
David Warburton
Matt Warman
Giles Watling
Helen Whately
Heather Wheeler
Craig Whittaker
John Whittingdale
Bill Wiggin
Gavin Williamson
Sarah Wollaston
Mike Wood
William Wragg
Jeremy Wright
Nadhim Zahawi
DUP
Gregory Campbell
Nigel Dodds
Jeffrey Donaldson
Paul Girvan
Ian Paisley
Emma Little Pengelly
Gavin Robinson
Jim Shannon
David Simpson
Sammy Wilson
So has the cap on pay rises for nurses been lifted yet?Â
In September of 2017 Theresa May began to show flexibility, allowing pay rises for police officers and prison workers.Â
Then in March 2018 she lifted the cap on pay rises for NHS workers.Â
Unions including Unison and the Royal College of Nursing agreed on a pay rise of 6.5 per cent over three years for nurses, paramedics, midwives and healthcare assistants.
This would take starting pay for nurses from around £22,000 in 2018 to £25,000 next year.Â
Will nurses be paid more because of the coronavirus outbreak?Â
Matt Hancock has said that he is "sympathetic" to the argument that the nurses who are risking their lives to protect us from Covid-19 should be paid more, but that "now is not the moment to enter into a pay negotiation".Â
The Health Secretary has also been criticised for not knowing how many nurses had died of the virus when appearing on BBC Question Time.Â
He later paid tribute to those who had lost their lives to coronavirus whilst working for the NHS.Â