Scottish Ambulance Service staff have carried out a total of 3,342,486 hours of paid overtime in the last five years – and over a quarter of a million in the first five months of 2022 alone.
Figures obtained by the Scottish Conservatives via a FOI request show SAS staff work an average of around 612,000 paid overtime hours a year.
The news comes after a pay dispute with the Scottish Government led the union Unite to ban ambulance overtime, and GMB announce a 26-hour ambulance worker strike for the end of November.
Since 2017, total yearly ambulance overtime costs have increased by 50% – from around £11.8m in 2017 to £17.5m last year. Total costs have topped £75m over the last five years.
The figures do not include unpaid overtime.
Scottish Conservative Shadow Health Secretary, Dr Sandesh Gulhane said: “These figures are deeply concerning. Not only do they underline the huge impact overtime bans will have on our vital emergency services, but they also show how reliant we have become on the goodwill of exhausted frontline staff.
“Ambulance staff are used to unimaginable pressure, but years of SNP failures on workforce planning have left them understaffed, overworked and ultimately brought them to breaking point.
“It’s no wonder paramedics and ambulance workers feel they have no choice but to take industrial action.
“The SNP are already presiding over a crisis in our A&E departments – strikes and overtime bans in our ambulance service could be utterly devastating this winter.
“It’s clear that frontline NHS staff – like the rest of the country – have no faith in Humza Yousaf to give them the vital support and fair working conditions they deserve.
“Humza Yousaf has completely lost the trust of our heroic NHS workers. Nicola Sturgeon must now urgently intervene, sack her incompetent Health Secretary and work to end this damaging dispute, before it’s too late.”
Notes:
Please see below a table of annual total Scottish Ambulance Service overtime costs, hours paid and number of staff paid.
|
Year |
Total overtime costs |
Total overtime hours paid |
Number of staff paid |
|
|
2017/18 |
£11,773,148 |
592,635 |
3963 |
|
|
2018/19 |
£11,991,541 |
566,829 |
4050 |
|
|
2019/20 |
£13,107,892 |
586,950 |
4026 |
|
|
2020/21 |
£15,917,437 |
680,448 |
4489 |
|
|
2021/22 |
£17,580,149 |
634,064 |
5311 |
|
|
2022* |
£7,945,312 |
281,560 |
4835 |
|
|
TOTAL: |
£78,315,479 |
3,342,486 |
AVG: |
4446 |
*Figures for April-August 2022
(Scottish Conservative FOI, available on request)