Shocking take on nurses’ pay makes readers gasp out out loud

One opinion on nurses' pay is slammed by outraged readers, while David Walliams gets called out for his bad behaviour.

One opinion on nurses’ pay is slammed by outraged readers, while David Walliams gets called out for his bad behaviour.

■ I gasped out loud when I read the letter from Johnny from Hertfordshire about nurses striking over pay (MetroTalk, Fri), as I could not believe what I was reading.

To suggest that a nurse’s role is ‘vocational’ and therefore does not require a decent salary is beyond belief.

My son and fiancée work for the NHS and are regularly required to work additional hours on weekends and evenings, for which they’re given timeoff in lieu. But due to staff shortages and the number of patients awaiting treatment, they are often unable to take off the accrued hours, which are then lost, meaning they have worked for the NHS for free.

The NHS has survived as long as it has only because of the goodwill of many of the staff, going above and beyond what is required of them, and this has long been exploited by the NHS itself and government.

Nurses and other NHS frontline staff deserve to be paid a decent wage. If nothing else, decent salaries will encourage staff to stay and also attract new employees, which is desperately needed right now. Jackie, London

■ Johnny writes that nurses take the job as a vocation – he obviously does not understand the word ‘vocation’.

Each and every one of the employees of the NHS are trained to do their job professionally and correctly all the time, from the groundsman that sweeps up your litter in the hospital grounds, to the consultant who advises you in your time of need.

Each and every one of them deserves the pay to allow them to work without the worry of where their next food will come from. Tony B, Thailand

■ It’s all well and good saying that NHS workers deserve the 17.6 per cent wage increase they are asking for but what everybody should accept is that the NI contributions for everyone should go up to pay for it. Withall, by email

■ Nurses are being paid too much and are just being greedy. Richard Freeman, London

■ With all the strikes, perhaps now is a good time to buy cheap camping gear. For now is the winter of our discount tent! Andy, Birmingham

Verdict: Judge Walliams isn’t funny

■ It’s been revealed that David Walliams made crude sexual insults about Britain’s Got Talent performers to his fellow judges (Metro, Fri). He may write successful children’s books but he is not funny.

Maybe he was during the first couple of years with his larking about on BGT, but then he took it all beyond a joke. And if what he said was ‘private’, as he stated in his apology, it just indicates exactly what a disgusting person he is. Anne, London

Suspend police who held protest reporter

■ The Hertfordshire police officers who arrested LBC radio’s Charlotte Lynch (Metro, Thu) as she reported on the Just Stop Oil protests on the M25 should be suspended.

What a den of incompetence our police forces are becoming when innocent people are getting arrested for doing their jobs. I Robertson, Heathfield

Cash incentives could help reduce population growth

■ I’m glad more people are coming forward with views about population growth as part of the broader debate around climate change.

To answer Gordon (MetroTalk, Fri), who asked how we might limit growth, there are no easy solutions, but we need to make suggestions instead of being totally opposed to the idea.

Governments could use incentives and disincentives so that couples who decide to have no children by a certain age get a cash sum and those who have one child get a lesser sum. Anyone having three or more children could have to pay a higher rate of tax.

Before people start picking holes in the idea, remember it’s a suggestion – we need more like that to future-proof our planet. Nathan, Essex

■ We need fundamental change to save the planet… but it must not inconvenience me. Do you see the fundamental problem? Neil Dance, Birmingham

Spirit of the Sixties: Could The Monkees have been heard in the attic?

■ Regarding all the letters about ghosts (MetroTalk, Fri). I was very sceptical until one night I heard songs from that Sixties band The Monkees mysteriously being played in my attic. Now I’m A Believer… Martin Lawrence, South Croydon

■ Some readers apparently believe in reincarnation (MetroTalk). Knowing my luck, I’d probably come back as myself! Mike Lawrence, Woking

■ Lewis (MetroTalk, Fri) quotes Christopher Hitchens as saying ‘that which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence’.

So where does this leave creationism and the belief that God created the world in six days?

This is important, given there is pressure from the religious right in the US to require creationism to be taught on a par with the theory of evolution. David, Sunderland

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