Secretary of State for Health and Social Care Matt Hancock spoke at the East London Foundation Trust on the launch of the NHS People Plan.

The government has launched proposals to make pensions more flexible for senior clinicians delivering frontline care.

The government has launched proposals to make pensions more flexible for senior clinicians delivering frontline care.

High-earning senior clinicians will be able to support more patients while saving into their NHS pension without facing significant tax charges, under plans launched by the government today.

The government will consult on proposals to offer senior clinicians a new pensions option. This would allow them to build their NHS pension more gradually over their career by making steadier contributions towards their pension, without facing regular, significant tax charges.

It would mean clinicians can freely take on additional shifts to reduce waiting lists, fill rota gaps or take on further supervisory responsibilities. 

A proposal known as a 50:50 option would allow clinicians to halve their pension contributions in exchange for halving the rate of pension growth.

Senior doctors have said that pension tax charges are discouraging them from taking extra work to support patients and causing them to question whether to remain in the NHS Pension Scheme.

An independent review of the GP partnership model found this issue was a factor for many GPs in deciding to retire early. 57% of GPs who retired in 2018 to 2019 took early retirement, a total of 610.

The agreement is an important part of the NHS’s first ever People Plan, published on 3 June 2019.

The interim plan focuses on actions to:

• recruit more staff
• make the NHS a great place to work
• support staff to deliver modern care

Retaining the NHS’s highly skilled clinical workforce is an important part of delivering the ambitions for patient care set out in the NHS Long Term Plan.

The government will continue to examine the evidence on how this specific issue affects other public sector workforces.

Health and Social Care Secretary, Matt Hancock, said:

Our NHS runs on the hard work and dedication of brilliant staff who deliver world-class care for patients every day. Each and every senior consultant, nurse or GP is crucial to the future of our NHS, yet we are losing too many of our most experienced people early because of frustrations over pensions.

We have listened to the concerns of hardworking staff across the country and are determined to find a solution that better supports our senior clinicians so we can continue to attract and keep the best people.

The reforms we are setting out today will give clinicians greater flexibility to manage their pensions, have more control over their future, and offer a deal that’s fair to doctors, taxpayers, and the patients they care for.

Third man gets suspended sentence and night curfew following waste crime convictions.

A trio of waste criminals have been given prison sentences and told to pay back nearly a quarter of a million pounds after fly-tipping a court heard was “on a commercial scale.”

The men, from east London or Essex, were convicted of dumping hundreds of tonnes of waste at several locations across Barking, Havering, Hertfordshire and Essex between 2012 and 2014.

Sites used by the group included a yard in Waltham Cross owned by Network Rail.

Investigators from the Environment Agency first discovered the men had broken into a yard in Choats Road in Barking in October 2012. CCTV showed William Jones, Glenn Harper and Sean Collard dumping a mix of household waste, wood and textiles from a lorry with false number plates. There was so much waste on board, it was spilling out onto the ground.

Once more captured on CCTV, the gang struck the following month at a printing works at Thurrock in Essex. Over several nights, they used an articulated lorry to tip 640 tonnes of aggregate – stones, rubble, earth, clay and chalk – at the site in Oliver Road, costing the landowners more than £120,000 to clear.

At New Year 2013, Jones rented a yard from Network Rail a stone’s throw from the M25, at Waltham Cross in Hertfordshire. Environment Agency officers later found the site in Bryanstone Road was filled with rotting waste. This highly-organised criminality saw the waste wrapped in bales of black plastic.

There has never been any suggestion Network Rail knew anything about the criminal activity on their land.

It would be almost a year before the gang struck again and back in Barking. In October 2013, Environment Agency investigators pursued a lorry driven by Collard between addresses either side of the A13. He was seen dumping more aggregate at a building site in Abbey Road, soon joined by Jones and Harper in a Citroen van.

The criminals were arrested by Essex Police back on the A13, at the Environment Agency’s request. Collard told police he was just test-driving the lorry.

The final act in the gang’s 18-month spree of dumping waste illegally took place with a series of visits to a former landfill site at Rainham in Essex in May 2014. The men were identified by Environment Agency officers at the facility, using a lorry to move concrete blocks designed to prevent access. Collard was seen dumping mixed waste there on multiple occasions.

Emma Viner, area enforcement manager for the Environment Agency, said:

Jones, Harper and Collard had no concern for the cost to the landowners or taxpayers, less still, the harm dumping hundreds of tonnes of waste would have on the environment. This highly-organised operation broke the law on a commercial scale, but that same law caught up with them in the end.

The prison sentences laid down in court by the judge show crime does not pay, also proven by more than £200,000 recovered from the men in a proceeds of crime order or court costs.

Sitting at Snaresbrook Crown court on 22 May 2019, Judge Patricia Lees said the trio’s criminal behaviour was motivated by money, with a financial cost to landowners, residents and the public purse, as well as causing environmental damage. She sentenced Jones, 39, of Jack Clow Road, Stratford, to 13 months in prison, ordering him to pay back £80,000 in proceeds of crime inside 12 weeks, or have his jail term extended by 18 months.

Harper, 33, of Arterial Road, Wickford, Essex, was given a custodial sentence of 12 months, and has to pay back £146,755 within 12 weeks, or face an additional 24 months in prison.

The court may increase the proceeds of crime orders against Jones and Harper, as they benefitted financially by more than £700,000.

Collard, 53, of New Road, Rainham, was sentenced to 8 months in prison, suspended for 2 years, 200 hours of unpaid work and a curfew between 7.30pm and 5.30am, in force for 12 weeks. The Environment Agency was awarded costs against Collard of £10,000.

Jones, Harper and Collard pleaded guilty to a combination of counts of breaching environmental law.