As evidenced by her payslip, Kiran did pay more tax than usual in July after she says she worked extra shifts earlier this year to cover staff sickness – that money should be refunded later by HMRC.
She has just finished paying off her student loan, although she says – like other junior doctors – there are unavoidable costs which do not show up on her payslip.
She pays £433 a year to the GMC to be on the doctors’ register. There are charges to be a member of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, and she has had to pay thousands of pounds in exam fees.
Plus there is the cost of personal indemnity insurance – just under £700 a year – to protect her in case she is sued for medical negligence.
In a typical month, Kiran says she takes home around £2,400 after tax and deductions for a 27-hour week. If she was working full-time then she would earn a total annual salary of roughly £69,000.
“Pay is important but so are all the other things that make you want to go to work,” she says. “This is not the job I signed up to do 10 years ago and I have seen a decline in morale, in our working environment and in our working conditions.”
