LONDON - More than 300,000 members of Britain's largest nursing union will begin voting Thursday over a strike to demand a pay rise that keeps up with soaring inflation, the biggest ballot in its 106-year history.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said it has been forced to take this action after years of real-terms wage cuts deterred people from joining the state-funded National Health Service (NHS), leaving huge staffing gaps across the service.

"We are understaffed, undervalued and underpaid," RCN general-secretary and chief executive Pat Cullen said. "For years, our profession has been pushed to the edge, and now patient safety is paying the price."

The union said it wanted a pay rise of 5 per cent above inflation to overcome real-term pay cuts as its members struggle to cope with the soaring cost of living.

The union's boss said below inflation pay meant workers could neither afford to stay in nor join the profession, adding that "patient care was at risk" due to thousands of unfilled nursing jobs across Britain.

A spokesman for the government's Department of Health and Social Care said they hoped nurses would consider carefully the impact any strike would have on patients.

"We value the hard work of NHS nurses and are working hard to support them," she said, setting out previous pay rises it has given to the sector.

The NHS, still recovering from the hit to services during the Covid-19 pandemic, is facing its worst ever staffing crisis amid a backlog for care.

The NHS, which has provided healthcare free at the point of use since 1948, has also seen a record rise in the number of people waiting to start routine hospital treatment and increased wait times at accident and emergency departments. REUTERS