New poll shows nurses have been forced to take out payday loans, borrow money from friends and take on extra hours in order to supplement their wages.
The results of a new survey by nurse’s union the Royal College of Nursing is being used to convince the government to increase the pay of NHS workers.
The results of the survey found that as many as 6% of nurses have had to take out a high interest ‘payday loan’ in the past year to pay their bills and day-to-day living costs.
25% have had to borrow money from their family, friends or their bank, while 23% have taken on an extra job and 50% had to do overtime just to cover the household bills and expenses, according to the poll of 7,720 UK nurses.
40% of nurses said that they have lost sleep over their money worries, with 56% saying they have had to cut back on food and travel costs, 20% admitting to struggling to pay their gas and electric bills and 11% have been late on their mortgage or rent payments. Over the past year, 2.3% of nurses have used charities or food banks.
The Royal College of Nursing also found that as many as 37% of nurses are currently looking for a new job, which has increased from 24% a decade ago.
More than 50% of these said they are seeking employment outside of the NHS, and 14% looking for new jobs abroad.
Director of the RCN in the East of England, Teresa Budrey, said:
There are nurses who have to use food banks to keep going, there are nurses that have second jobs, and many of them will do bank work so they will do extra hours for their employer under a nurse bank agreement.
Equally there are some who do a second job away from nursing to enable them to have a break to recover their resilience to go back into the challenges of the nursing world.
Facebook Comments