PCNs will need to wait for further detail on how the 37,000 staff employed through the additional roles reimbursement scheme (ARRS) are included in pay uplifts planned for 2024/25.
Last week, the Government announced a 2024/25 pay award of 5.5% for Agenda for Change staff and 6% for GPs partners, practice staff and salaried GPs, backdated to 1 April 2024.
However, our sister title Pulse PCN said it understands that further detail on ARRS eligibility will be confirmed in due course.
Last year, reimbursements under the ARRS were uplifted to match the Agenda for Change pay increase, but there was no overall change to the total funding available. This meant that while PCNs could pay current staff more, they had less money to hire further roles.
Clinical director of West Warrington PCN, Dr Laura Mount called for ARRS staff to be ‘treated fairly’.
She said: ‘I hope that ARRS staff are treated fairly and for that to happen we would need to see an announcement of a 7-8% ARRS budget uplift to accommodate for on costs.
‘Without it we will not be able to afford the pay rises without cutting current service provision which is hard to do when we are mid-year and staff are on permanent contracts,’ she said adding that similar rises need to be made to the management and clinical director payments to ‘avoid discrimination’.
Last week, it was also announced that GPs will be added to the ARRS, with a ‘ring fenced’ extra £82 being put into the existing £1.4bn ARRS pot, to ensure existing ARRS staff are not affected.
And earlier this year, it was revealed that PCNs in England had underspent on ARRS funding by more than £45m in the year 2023/24.
A version of this article was first published by our sister title, Pulse PCN
