Reacting to the publication of an independent review in the gender pay gap in medicine, Professor Michael Griffin OBE, President of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh said:
We wholeheartedly welcome both the findings of this report and its recommendations.
It is simply unacceptable that women hospital doctors earn 18.9% less per hour compared to their male counterparts and that leadership positions are still a largely male preserve. Two thirds of doctors in training grades are women but within consultant grades this drops to under half.
Indeed, it can take women up to 35 years to close the gender pay gap after having children, compared to around 15 years for graduates in other professions in the UK.
We know the reasons behind these imbalances are complex, so we acknowledge the report’s call for a systemic overhaul of pay points and pay scales.
The College has been supporting competency based training and more flexible working patterns for some time, so we appreciate that the report recommends that roles are advertised as flexible unless there is a strong justification not to and further restructuring of part time training.
However the report also acknowledges the need for further research into the ethnicity pay gap in the NHS, so similar work is urgently required to address this injustice too.
Good patient care comes from motivated and appreciated professionals so with a growing backlog of elective cases, winter and Covid pressures and an already stretched NHS workforce, we look forward to working with NHS bodies to bring these changes about.