NHS: Nurses

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

My Lords, first, I thank the NHS staff who have worked so hard over the Christmas and new year period. I point the noble Lord to the recent record; the NHS now has over 20,300 more nurses on our wards than in 2010 and over 52,000 more nurses in training. We have increased our training places by 25% since September 2018 and made available 3,000 more midwifery places to ensure that we can achieve this outcome. We have put in place several actions on recruitment and retention, because we need to retain our extremely experienced and excellent nurses and to recruit more nurses to support them. That is why we have announced this new package, which will not only increase nurse payment by 12% but provide support for those in training, attracting more nurses in to support those already in place.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, from the point of view of both retention and recruitment of nurses, would my noble friend not think it a good idea to allow student nurses who stay in the profession for a period of time to have their fees written off, given that because of their levels of pay they will not pay back the student loans required for the profession? That would save the taxpayer a good deal of money and encourage people to come into the profession.

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

I always take very careful note of proposals from my noble friend. At the moment, that is not under consideration, but it will certainly be looked into. As the entry salaries rise, it is more likely that student loans will be repaid, but what is important at this stage is that we attract the most nurses into the profession. At the moment students are able to access student loan funding for maintenance as well as the non-repayable funding from the DHSC, which means that we will meet our target of 50,000 more nurses by 2025, which is what we need to be able to deliver a sustainable NHS.