Oral Answers to Questions

Helen Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 15th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

1. What recent steps he has taken to tackle NHS workforce shortages.

[Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)]

8. What steps he is taking to recruit and retain additional staff in the NHS.

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

17. What recent steps he has taken to tackle NHS workforce shortages.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Hammond]

As I said a moment ago, the long-term plan sets out a framework to ensure that, over the next 10 years, the NHS will have the staff it needs. To ensure that we have the detailed plan the hon. Gentleman wants, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has commissioned Baroness Harding to lead a rapid and inclusive programme of work to set out a detailed workforce implementation plan, which will be published in the spring.

[Helen Jones]

Fifty per cent. of the staff the NHS will need in 15 years’ time are working there now, yet one in 10 nurses is leaving, 80% of junior doctors report excessive stress and six out of 10 consultants want to retire at 60 or before. Does the Minister not accept that this Government have presided over a disastrous decline in morale in the NHS, and will he say what the workforce plan will do to address it?

[Stephen Hammond]

Nurses are at the absolute heart of our NHS. There are 13,400 more nurses since May 2010. We have announced the biggest expansion of nurse training places, with 5,000 more available from 2018. Alongside that, we are opening up new routes. As the hon. Lady will know, the workforce is at the heart of the long-term plan and, as I have just said, a detailed workforce implementation plan will be published in the spring.