AN NHS boss received a “sickening” £410,000 pay-off it was revealed yesterday, hours after thousands of junior doctors had protested in Westminster over “unsafe contracts.”

David Flory, who has also been an adviser to Tory Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, had received the huge “termination payment” after quitting his fixed-term appointment.

He also enjoyed a salary of £210,000 plus pension benefits since he started the role in 2012, annual NHS Trust Development Authority accounts show.

Mr Flory announced that he was stepping down as chief executive of the authority in March.

On Monday night at least 3,000 trainee medics, who, as members of the British Medical Association (BMA), will soon be balloted over strike action, assembled in Westminster in a noisy protest.

Huge crowds chanting “Save our NHS” and “Where are you Jeremy [Hunt]?” carried placards condemning the new trainee contracts as “unsafe and unfair.”

The ballot will be held because the government wants to impose new terms and conditions on trainees from August 2016, the BMA junior doctors committee said.

The new contract involves pay cuts of up to 30 per cent, with overtime rates scrapped for working between 7am and 10pm on every day except Sunday.

A Department of Health spokesman described the ballot decision “disappointing.”

Unite union national officer for health Barrie Brown said Mr Flory’s pay-off was another reward for failure “that sickens the public.”

He called for legislation aiming to cap all public-sector pay-offs at £95,000 to be sped up.

He said: “The rationale for such a pay-off is a mystery at a time when the NHS is faced with very real cuts to budgets and services.”

There is “no justification for such eye-wateringly huge pay-outs” when the Tories claim there isn’t enough money to employ sufficient front-line staff, Unison general secretary Dave Prentis said.

“It must be galling for NHS workers who have had their pay held down for many years to see senior executives getting such golden goodbyes,” he added.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health said that Mr Flory’s pay-off “reflects over 20 years at board level where his dedication and exceptional service were invaluable to the NHS.

“However, we understand public concern about executive pay, which is why we’re clamping down on senior NHS managers’ salaries and capping redundancy pay,” she parped.