THE Health Department has come under fire over new administrative roles which pay significantly better than clinical ones.
The posts, advertised on the government’s website, include a “freedom to speak up guardian”, who would earn up to £74,000 a year and a “rota change manager” with an annual salary of up to £67,874.
The ideal candidate for the latter post is described as an “expert at scheduling” who could support the Health Department on its “digital journey with e-rostering and managing the clinical risk of staffing ensuring optimal levels of medical staffing on each shift”.
Writing on social media, consultant cardiologist Dr Andrew Mitchell described the rota-change manager salary as “another example of where pay structures are so wrong for medical staff morale, retention and recruitment”.
Dr Mitchell criticised the remuneration for being more than one-and-a-half times the salary of junior doctors, who he said “have more responsibility and risk”.
Dr Moyra Journeaux, a registered nurse and postgraduate programme manager at the General Hospital’s Harvey Besterman Education Centre, called the job advert “atrocious”.
The Health and Community Services Department said that the role of rota-change manager had been “created and appropriately evaluated”.
Responding to criticism about the comparably low pay of junior doctors, HCS said that their pay was set by the NHS while they work in the department and they are then also paid a Jersey supplement.
A “head of compliance and regulation” for the States of Jersey Ambulance Service is being advertised with a salary of up to £74,599 per year.
The “freedom to speak up guardian” is described as “key” in ensuring that Health staff “are actively encouraged, supported and enabled to speak up, helping them feel psychologically safe to do”.
The successful candidate will “to help the organisation become a more open and transparent place to work, enabling a positive culture of ‘speaking up’”.
