Tory minister hits back at criticism of 1% pay rise for NHS staff

Nadine Dorries dismisses anger over ‘pitiful’ planned increase by arguing that nurses ‘do their job because they love their job’

NHS nurses transport a patient out of surgery.
(Image credit: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Nadine Dorries has shrugged off criticism of a proposed 1% pay rise for doctors and nurses by insisting that she was “pleasantly surprised” they were getting a wage hike at all.

Health unions have described the meagre increase as “bitterly disappointing”, while Labour has accused Chancellor Rishi Sunak of being “too cowardly” to mention the NHS pay plan in his budget speech earlier this week.

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 Sorcha Bradley is a writer at The Week and a regular on “The Week Unwrapped” podcast. She worked at The Week magazine for a year and a half before taking up her current role with the digital team, where she mostly covers UK current affairs and politics. Before joining The Week, Sorcha worked at slow-news start-up Tortoise Media. She has also written for Sky News, The Sunday Times, the London Evening Standard and Grazia magazine, among other publications. She has a master’s in newspaper journalism from City, University of London, where she specialised in political journalism.