Statement attributable to Robyn Shearer, Health New Zealand Executive Lead Industrial Relations

Health New Zealand has today made a new offer to the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists (ASMS) and we encourage the union to take this offer to their members.

The offer includes salary increases between 3.5% and 11% depending on experience and funding for incentives to help retain senior doctors in hard to staff areas and specialities.

We value our doctors and want to do the best we can for them. We are committed to reaching a settlement with ASMS and we believe the offer made today is a fair and reasonable one.

Under the offer made today:

  • A first-year specialist would receive a $17,700 (9.5%) increase on base salary and all other salary related remuneration (e.g. KiwiSaver).
  • A second-year specialist would receive a $11,800 (6.2%) increase on base salary and all other salary related remuneration (e.g. KiwiSaver).
  • These specialists would also receive further increase of 1.5% over the course of the proposed settlement.

For specialist currently on Step 4 and above the offer includes increases of between 3.5% or 3.8% applied over a 21-month period.

We have listened to the union on their concerns regarding growing and retaining our senior doctor workforce. In the offer today we have included funding of $34 million over the term of the proposed settlement to fund incentives to help retain senior doctors in location and services that have been hard to staff.

The offer made expires on 31 August.

  • Senior doctors receive a base salary relative to their level of experience. There is a 15-step pay scale for senior doctors that they continue to progress through on a yearly basis.
  • The average total FTE salary package for a senior doctor is $343,500. The figure includes base salary, salary related and non-salary related remuneration items such as on-call duties, overtime, super payment, availability allowance, recruitment and retention allowance, ED allowance, etc.  The figure does not include car parking fee, travel and accommodation, CME and professional membership fee and other reimbursement items.
  • It is the average salary package for SMOs on specialist scale only of the ASMS collective agreement as of 31/05/2024. Approximately 92% of senior doctors covered by the collective agreement are specialists. The figure also includes some IEAs.
  • The Senior Medical Officers collective agreement is a “minimum rates” document, allowing for additional terms and conditions to be negotiated. These additional payments sit above the collective agreement and are negotiated nationally, locally, by speciality or department, and/or individually.
  • Additionally, under the collective agreement senior doctors receive a Continued Medical Education allowance of $16,000 per year (pro-rated for part time employees).
  • Under the collective agreement senior doctors are entitled to six weeks annual leave per year.