SCOTLAND’S largest health union has suspended its NHS strike ballot to consult members over the Scottish Government’s latest pay offer, it has announced.

Unison will ask members if they are willing to accept the £2205 flat rate pay offer for all NHS staff effective from April this year, following a meeting of its health committee this afternoon.

The union had begun balloting its 50,000 NHS members - including nurses, midwives, domestics, porters and admin workers - for strike action earlier this month, recommending they back walkouts.

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The vote will close from Wednesday, instead of October 31 as planned.

The new pay offer came after negotiators from Unison and other NHS unions met with representatives from the Scottish Government at the end of last week.

Wilma Brown, chair of Unison's health committee, said: "This is a final pay offer from the Scottish government, it is also significantly different from the previous offers, so we think it is right that NHS members decide whether they are willing to accept it.

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“Unison is a member-led union, so members will decide. NHS staff are working through two crises: an NHS crisis and a cost-of-living crisis.

"This offer will go some way to helping them with the latter but we have a huge amount of work to do to get our NHS to be world-class again, irrespective of the outcome of this consultation the Scottish government need to see this as the beginning of a journey back to full health for the NHS.”