More than 39,000 people have signed a petition calling on the Scottish government to extend a £500 ‘thank you’ payment to agency and student nurses who have been working on the frontline of the fight against covid.

The payment, first announced in November by the First Minister at the SNP conference, was promised to “all staff” within the NHS, primary care, social care and other settings.

But the Scottish government has confirmed agency nursing staff will not receive the thank-you payment, prompting one company to launch a petition that has received tens of thousands of signatures in just seven days.

It comes after one of the country’s largest unions recently warned the government had ‘failed to realise’ that some workers would also face a reduction in their state benefits if they accepted the money.

The Scottish government wrote to affected workers saying they had the option to delay the bonus and should raise their concerns with the Department of Work and Pensions.

The £500 payment announcement raised “false hopes”, says Sakib Rafiq, chief operating officer at the Glasgow nursing agency H1 Healthcare and one of the those behind the petition pressing the government to reconsider.

Their exclusion from the bonus has left staff feeling “absolutely undervalued”, Mr Rafiq told healthandcare.scot:

“The government has completely messed up here and announced a £500 bonus only for NHS workers, absolutely ruling out and forgetting students who have worked in unpaid placements and agency workers who have been working in the heart of covid.

“The bonus was announced and it seemed to say that anyone who has worked in the heart of the pandemic will be thanked…but then you get confirmation the only people who will be getting it will be NHS workers.

“Not even all those in the NHS who will be getting the payment will have been anywhere near covid areas.”

Mr Rafiq says he was pushed into action after a nurse he had worked with for five years worked with covid patients and passed away after contracting the virus.

“What we want is everyone who has worked in the heart of the pandemic to be treated equally and appreciated,” he said.

Mr Rafiq also added that a pay rise for staff may have been a more obvious and “more sensible way” to show appreciation to NHS staff that would not have left agency staff feeling undervalued.

He said: “You have students working in placements at the worst times you could think of, unpaid. Is that how we should be treating the younger generation and encouraging them to work in this sector, by using them as freebies made to work in the heart of covid?

“It’s causing a division and made people feel undervalued; the government has more or less stated that these staff should go to their employers for a thank you, but that’s not what they want – they want recognition from the government.”

A Scottish government spokesperson said: “This payment is not being extended to private agency staff in the NHS or social care sector.

"For people working for private employers, it would be for their employer to determine their remuneration and any additions to existing pay which may be appropriate for these staff.

“This thank you payment recognises the particular debt we all owe to health and care staff, who have been – and continue to be – on the very front line of this crisis, helping to save lives and to protect us all. It is a straightforward thank you for their hard work and recipients are free to spend it as they wish."

Scottish Care – which represents a majority of private and third sector care providers in Scotland – has previously warned the payment was announced without any process in place to make sure it could get to the pockets of frontline staff.

Last week the Royal College of Nursing warned staff were ‘slipping through the net’ when it came to vaccinations. A survey carried out by the college revealed one in three agency nurses had not yet had their covid vaccination.

 

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