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Sunak: I’d love to give nurses a pay rise – but we can’t right now

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Rishi Sunak has said he would love to give nurses a “massive” pay rise – but insisted the money needs to be prioritised on other areas.

NHS staff were subjected to a pay freeze during Covid, he said, but said: “I would love to give nurses a massive pay rise - who wouldn’t? It would make my life easier.”

In an interview on his first 100 days in office, he said: “It’s about choices.” A record sum was going into the NHS but more doctors and nurses and equipment were needed, he said.

But inflation was making life difficult for nurses, and when lots of people got high pay settlements it made life harder for everyone, the prime minister insisted. “It’s the right thing for the country to stay the course,” he said.

Mr Sunak agreed to look at the issue of car parking costs for nurses, but refused to agree it should be free.

The prime minister also said he “wholeheartedly believes” he can turn around the mess the country is in by controlling inflation, growing the economy, cutting NHS waiting lists and stopping migrant boats.

Saying he was proud of what the government had achieved so far, he cited new deals with France and Albania to reduce numbers of illegal migrants, saying the UK was already putting Albanians on flights out of Britain.

He vowed that the Rwanda deportation scheme would happen, and that illegal migrants would understand they could be deported but that the UK would always be a compassionate country for those fleeing war or repression, such as Hong Kong, Syria or Ukraine.

“But we’re not a soft touch,” he insisted.

Asked by interviewer Piers Morgan whether he had time to make changes before the next election, the prime minister replied:“Yes, I wholeheartedly believe that, and I’m giving it nearly everything I’ve got and, of course, people might not feel that today and for all the reasons that you set out earlier, the situation is tough but I want people to have confidence that it will get better.

“So, if you go through those things I said: halve inflation, yes, I believe by the end of the year we can halve inflation.

The Sunak doctrine, he said, was about making sure people could feel proud of the UK and have peace of mind things would be better for their children and grandchildren.

And he told people to “have hope” because I can make it better and I will make it better”.

Morgan said the interview, conducted to mark Mr Sunak’s 100 days in office, was aimed at finding out who the PM really was and what motivated him.

Asked when he would release his tax returns, Mr Sunak said he would be transparent and his returns would be released soon.

On whether he had profited from Moderna’s share price rise, he said his money was in a blind trust so he did not control what was in it.

Mr Sunak said he stood for the job “out of a sense of duty” and had assumed his time in front-line politics had ended when he resigned as Boris Johnson’s chancellor.

The Tories are trailing Labour by more than 20 points in most polls, with the latest poll of polls putting the Conservatives on 27 per cent and the opposition on 48 per cent support.

The prime minister is also under pressure over mounting Tory sleaze claims, the winter crisis in the NHS, growing public-sector strikes and deepening cost-of-living woes.