Military Medics Pay Freeze – Timing Is Everything

The last 24 hours have seen much media coverage of the news that Consultants, Medical Practitioners and Dentists in the Armed Forces are to have their pay frozen.

Many are particularly enraged as this announcement follows the Government’s acceptance, in full, of the Armed Forces Pay Review Body’s recommendation that a 2% salary increase be awarded to Service personnel from 1st April 2010.

The British Medical Association have been extremely vocal in their denunciation of this news and have suggested that the pay freeze would only worsen the MoD’s efforts in recruiting and retaining medical professionals. The BMA pointed to a survey they had commissioned amongst military doctors which showed that a third of them were planning on leaving the Service within the next 12 months.

If this does indeed prove to be the case it could leave the Defence Medical Services with something of a problem.

The MoD position seems to be that the pay for senior doctors and dentists in the military is comparable with that in the NHS, a fact borne out by the Pay Review Body, and is therefore ample.

In terms of the pay freeze itself, it does at first glance seem to be unfair that highly trained medics should be penalised in this way simply because their expertise puts them at a grade where they are among the highest earners in military terms – 800 members of the Armed Forces are paid in excess of £100,000, of whom, 674 are doctors or dentists.

Some would argue, though, that the many of the higher earners in both the pulic and private sectors have endured similar pay freezes of late and that, bankers aside, this is the grim reality of the current economic climate.

However, the timing of this annoucement suggests that the Government knew full well that this would not be the majority view – whispered quietly, as it was, on the same day that the date for the general election was finally confirmed and party political battle cries issued forth from the rooftops.

It would be improper to suggest that this was a Jo Moore-esque moment but politics, like comedy, is all about timing.