Posted 01 June 2023 - 13:40
Posted 01 June 2023 - 13:40
News
Rise in NHS nurse numbers fails to dent huge vacancy list
A workforce emergency remains despite a rise in the number of nurses in England in the past year, with over 40,000 nursing posts still unfilled
A workforce emergency remains despite a rise in the number of nurses in England in the past year, with over 40,000 nursing posts still unfilled
A workforce staffing emergency still exists despite a rise in the number of nurses working in England’s NHS, a union has warned.
The government has hailed a ‘record’ number of nurses working in England’s NHS, with the latest workforce statistics published by NHS Digital last week showing an increase of 12,956 nurses in England between March 2022 (315,499) and March 2023 (328,455).
But NHS vacancy data published on the same day shows while there has been a slight decrease from record vacancy rates last year (46,241), there were still 40,095 unfilled nursing posts in the final quarter of 2022-23.
Health service still needs many thousands more nurses and other health staff
While the increases in nurses working in the health service is welcome, Unison head of health Sara Gorton warned that the health service was still ‘many thousands of nurses and other health staff short’.
‘Much of the progress made in getting staffing numbers up has been down to trusts recruiting nurses extensively from overseas. This is not a sustainable solution for the longer term. There is still very much a workforce staffing emergency,’ she said.
‘The price paid is unsafe staffing levels, risks to patient health and much money wasted on excessive agency cover costs. The long-awaited workforce plan cannot come soon enough.’
Think tank the Health Foundation said the past 12 months had seen growth in the right direction but the NHS was still well short of the numbers needed to bolster the workforce.
Post COVID heavy workload burnout challenge needs to be addressed more effectively, says expert
Health Foundation senior fellow James Buchan told Nursing Standard: ‘It would require 40,000-plus nurses just to fill those vacancies. And that’s just looking at the supply side, that does not even get us into clear assessment of demand.
‘It is good to see the data pointing in the right direction, but where there still are tens of thousands of vacancies we also need to recognise that more nurses is not enough. The NHS Long Term Plan needs to be clear about what it identifies as supply and demand gaps that need to be filled beyond that vacancy measure.’
He said the NMC’s inaugural leavers’ survey results, which indicated more nurses were leaving the profession prematurely due to workplace pressures, suggested that the ‘post COVID heavy workload burnout challenge’ would have to be addressed more effectively to mitigate ongoing retention problems.
Health and social care secretary Steve Barclay said the government was continuing to make progress on strengthening the NHS workforce, with record numbers of nursing staff registered to practice in the UK.
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