The president of the Order of Doctors on Tuesday said a “full agreement” between unions would give “greater security and greater peace of mind” to the government’s proposals, following a “temporary agreement” reached only with the Independent Union of Doctors (SIM). .
“A full agreement will obviously provide greater security and greater peace of mind regarding the proposals. [do Governo]”, Carlos Cortés stressed to Lusa after the agreement reached on Tuesday between the government and SIM for a salary increase in January 2024, but which was rejected by the National Federation of Doctors (Fnam).
Carlos Cortés stressed that he would still discuss with the unions the latest round of negotiations with the government to understand “exactly what doubts still remain regarding the lack of a full agreement with the two unions.”
“I would very much like to know what the terms of the agreement were. (…) In such situations with several unions, it is preferable to have a complete agreement that satisfies all parties, [pois] There would be more peace here,” he emphasized.
The President also recalled that he intends to figure out “what the actual advantages for doctors are, not only in terms of salaries, which is important, but also in terms of working conditions for doctors.”
The agreement between the Government and SIM to review NHS doctors’ pay scales includes increases of 14.6% for 40-hour hospital assistants, 12.9% for graduate assistants and 10.9% for senior assistants.
“A similar model will be applied to every medical career,” the Ministry of Health emphasizes, adding that the agreed salary increase applies to all doctors, “giving preference to lower salaries.”
According to the guardianship, “this is a solution that guarantees the stability of the functioning of the social network – the basis for access to healthcare in Portugal.”
“In the current political circumstances, and due to the lack of timely consensus on all the issues discussed, namely the reduction of working hours to 35 hours, the government has proposed to the trade unions to enter into a temporary agreement to increase the salaries of doctors without changing the usual working period,” it explains. Ministry of Health.
The president of the National Federation of Doctors (Fnam), Joana Bordalo e Sa, said on Tuesday that she rejected the agreement because it was a bad deal for doctors and the National Health Service, which would “not allow doctors to gain a foothold in the SNS.” “.
Joana Bordalo y Sa insisted that Fnam fight for a salary increase that would be “fair for all doctors”, rejecting the guardianship proposal, which includes different percentage increases depending on categories.
“What the government presented to us was a maximum renewal of 15% and completely discretionary depending on the type of doctor. So 40-hour doctors will have a certain type of renewal, 42-hour full-time doctors much less, 35 hours even less, so that’s completely unacceptable,” he said.
According to the FNAM president, the federation came to the meeting with a proposal for a temporary increase of 30%, but admitted to lowering it.
“We even brought it down to 22%, 23% to get closer to what we thought was possible and budgeted for by the state,” referring to a table regarding the base salary of full-time doctors that has since been published .
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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