Chancellor faces backlash over pensions tax change as Labour pledge to reverse policy announced in budget
As my colleagues Aubrey Allegretti and Denis Campbell report, ministers and health unions are on the verge of a breakthrough in talks to resolve their long-running pay dispute that has triggered a series of NHS strikes in England, with an announcement expected later today.
In his interview on the Today programme this morning, Jeremy Hunt said nothing to counter suggestions that a deal is imminent. He said:
We are having discussions, quite good discussions I think, with unions.
We’ve been very flexible about what we’ve been prepared to offer. The only condition we put on those talks is we can’t give an offer that would itself fuel inflation and mean we are having the same discussions this time next year.
We don’t have an agreement yet, so I can’t tell you what the quantum is.
I am hopeful we will have an agreement. I think we’ve had some very positive discussions but let’s see where it ends up today.
All I will say is, if the government says we will do a different deal, we will find a way to pay for it. Yes, we would like to settle these disputes.
