§ Mr. Laurence RobertsonTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment he has made of the salaries paid to speech and language therapists in the NHS; who advises him on such salaries; what discussions he had with speech and language therapists before deciding on their pay settlement for 1999–2000; and if he will make a statement. [80049]
§ Mr. DenhamIn deciding pay for National Health Service staff, the Government need to take account of fairness, affordability, the prevailing economic climate and recruitment and retention. We have offered a pay increase of 2.8 per cent. to most NHS staff in 1999–2000, plus additional increases for staff groups where there is evidence of recruitment and retention problems. Discussions with the representatives of speech and language therapists as with representatives of other staff groups are continuing.
Advice from NHS management, including speech and language therapy service managers, is that there are no recruitment and retention problems with speech and language therapy. Their basic pay rates have increased by between 158 per cent. (minimum) and 170 per cent. (maximum) since 1984, more than those for any other NHS professional staff group.
Negotiations are also in progress to resolve speech and language therapists' outstanding equal pay claims and to align the pay of clinical psychologists, health care pharmacists and speech and language therapists for the future.