Midwives and maternity care assistants (MCAs) working in the NHS in Scotland have voted to accept a 5.5% pay offer.

The RCM’s consultation with its members resulted in 83 percent of eligible members voting to accept the offer, saying it was a step towards addressing long term pay cuts. Meanwhile 17 percent said that the offer was not acceptable.

The offer the RCM says meets the above inflation ask of the RCM’s pay claim and it’s now calling for swift implementation.

Commenting, the RCM’s Director for Scotland, Jaki Lambert, said:

“First of all, I’d like to thank all our members who took the time to share their views on this pay offer. We are your trade union and professional association, and we are led by you and the result of this consultation speaks for itself. That said we have told the Scottish Government that such a delay in announcing a pay offer every year has eroded the goodwill and morale of our hardworking midwives and MCAs and they must do better to ensure staff feel valued and are receiving fair pay uplifts on time in the future.”

The pay increase will be backdated to 1 April, the day it was due, and the RCM hopes members will receive their backdated uplift by the end of October with backdated pay in November

Early next week Emma Currer RCM’s National Officer in Scotland will meet with the collective staff side of the Scottish Terms and Conditions Committee (STAC) to collate all the Scottish NHS health unions’ consultation results. They will then inform the Scottish Government of the overall outcome on the 5.5% pay offer.

Jaki added:

“What we want to see now is this uplift in our members pockets as soon as possible, as they’ve waited long enough. So, we are calling on the Scottish Government not to delay any further and implement this well-deserved increase sooner rather than later.”

The RCM says it hopes members will receive their backdated uplift by the end of October and members can read more about what the increase means for them on the RCM’s new website here.