Education (Student Support) (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 2018

Lord O'Shaughnessy Excerpts

Monday 21st May 2018 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord O’Shaughnessy) (Con)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, on securing this debate, and express my gratitude to all noble Lords for speaking. I always welcome the high profile that issues relating to NHS staffing receive in this House and I am always pleased to debate our approach with noble Lords, who I know are motivated by a desire to protect and promote our world-class NHS, and bring both wisdom and expertise.

I will start by explaining the overall rationale behind the reforms that the Government are making. The decision to remove bursaries for nursing, midwifery and allied health profession students and to provide them with access to the student loan system was taken by the Department of Health—as was—in the 2015 spending review. One reason for that was that this group of students had access to less money through the NHS bursary system than students in the student loan system. By moving to the loan system, these students now typically receive a 25% increase in the financial resources available to them for living costs during their time at university.

[Lord Willis of Knaresborough]

Before the Minister goes one second further, will he confirm that the bursary money was free money? They did not have to pay that back. Now they have to pay back the whole loan.

[Lord O’Shaughnessy]

If the noble Lord will let me finish, I will get to that point. Like other graduates, student nurses will be required to repay these government-funded loans only once they are in employment and earning. It is important to state that the student loan repayment terms are progressive. From April 2018, individuals will make their contribution to the system only when they are earning more than £25,000. Monthly repayments are linked to income, not to interest rates or the amount borrowed, and the outstanding debt is written off after 30 years.

I am not the Education Minister in this House, although I seem to be covering this topic not only tonight but in other forums, but it is important to underline that the reason this system was introduced into this country by a Labour Government, reaffirmed by a coalition Government and continued by a Conservative Government, is that it means that the best-earning graduates, instead of having their fees entirely paid by taxpayers, including people who have never gone to university, make a contribution to the costs incurred, whereas those who are lower-earning through their lives, including those who will perhaps never earn more than £25,000, will make no contribution. That is a more progressive system of funding than one in which everybody gets it for free, no matter how much money they make in their life.

As I said, these reforms give student nurses access to more financial support, albeit they have to pay that back if they can afford to do so later in life. It also provides a level playing field with other students. But perhaps most importantly of all, these actions released about £1 billion of funding to be reinvested in the NHS front line. As a consequence, Health Education England plans to increase the number of fully funded nurse training places by 25% from September 2018. It is important to stress that Health Education England has made that decision as an independent body to meet the need for more nurses that we all agree is there.

As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, pointed out, this equates to around 5,000 more places each year—a major and welcome boost to our much-admired nursing workforce. My background is largely in education and I assure the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, that we understand the urgency of this task and the parallels with education that he mentioned.

[Baroness Watkins of Tavistock]

Is that for the clinical placement funding?

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

That is quite right. That is fully funded clinical placements—just for the sake of clarity. I thank the noble Baroness.

There is understandable concern among noble Lords, which has been expressed previously in this House, about the new system of financial support, but I want to be clear that we are giving the group of postgraduate students that we are discussing access to undergraduate maintenance and tuition fee loans, just as we do with postgraduate teachers. This represents a more generous package of support than the postgraduate master’s loan. We are also making available additional funding for childcare, travel to clinical placements and exceptional hardship funding to ensure that the students are fully supported and are able to complete their studies.

Furthermore, as many noble Lords have mentioned and as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins, welcomed, in the debate on the regulations in the other place on 9 May, my honourable friend the Minister of State for Health set out a range of additional support that we are investigating for postgraduate nursing students. This includes specific incentives such as “golden hellos” for postgraduates who go to work in mental health—where the noble Lord, Lord Willis, was quite right that we need to attract more nursing and where there has been a shortfall—the area of learning disability and community nursing. The Government have announced £10 million to support such incentives and we are considering how this should be best delivered.

Many noble Lords have expressed concern about the drop in number of undergraduate applications to nursing courses. We acknowledge that early indications from the latest UCAS data, published in April, show that the number of students applying to study nursing has decreased from this point in the cycle last year. However, that cycle is not yet over, so we need to apply some caution.

It is also worth noting, as noble Lords have pointed out, that there is a distinction between the decline in number of applications and that in the number of students starting their courses. That was exemplified last year, which showed a 23% drop in the number of applications compared to a 3% decline in the number of acceptances. That is regrettable, but it was still the second-highest number of acceptances on record. Several noble Lords have expressed their desire for further information on how this develops. I can confirm that my department has committed to publish an update in autumn 2018 following the close of the 2017-18 application cycle.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins, pointed out, there is a global challenge to recruit more nurses. We are working hard to make nursing as attractive a profession as possible. As a result of constructive dialogue over recent months, NHS Employers and the relevant trade unions began a consultation exercise on a three-year pay deal for NHS staff employed under the Agenda for Change contract. Under the plan, the starting salary of a nurse will rise to £24,907 by 2021, not only rewarding current staff for the incredible work they do but sending a clear signal to the country about how much nurses are valued.

We are boosting the attractiveness of the profession in a number of other ways, too. Nearly 4,500 nurses have started the return to practice programme and 3,000 have completed it. Across the country, NHS trusts are developing arrangements for flexible working and there is a concerted effort to tackle workplace bullying through an NHS-wide call to action. Our homes for staff programme is supporting NHS trusts to dispose of surplus land to help up to 3,000 nurses and other staff access affordable housing. I hope that gives the noble Lord, Lord Clark, some concrete examples to back up the warm words we use about supporting the nursing profession.

Several noble Lords have touched on new routes into nursing, which the Government are prioritising. The most significant innovation in this area was the announcement of a new nursing associate role in November 2016. Health Education England has already trained 2,000 nursing associates in a pilot programme and is planning to train up to 5,000 in 2018, with up to 7,500 nursing associates trained through the apprenticeship route in 2019. As well as creating a much-needed new role in its own right—I emphasise “in its own right”, as it is an augmentation to the nursing and other professions—nursing associate training offers an alternative route to becoming a registered nurse. We expect this “earn and learn” approach to be more attractive to older students, a concern which many noble Lords have raised.

To support this career path, Health Education England is developing a shortened nurse degree apprenticeship to facilitate transition from nurse associate to registered nurse, which will also automatically recognise the prior learning and experience gained in the nursing associate role. For the first time, apprentices will be able to work their way up from entry-level health work through to advanced clinical practice in nursing.

Several noble Lords expressed their concern about the apprenticeship route and the figure of only 30 nurses. The official data has been delayed and we believe that the figure is more like 250. We will be able to confirm that. It is a better start but, clearly, not yet the target that we want to reach. However, we believe that this stepped approach through the nursing associate role, giving the opportunities for a pause after two years and then to go on for two years, ought to be more attractive to employers than the current four-year commitment. This development of the nursing associate route therefore provides for a better use of the apprenticeship route.

I want to address a couple of what are perhaps misconceptions. The figure of 40,000 vacancies is used often in this House. I might be pedantic and disagree with that number—the quantum is just about right—but it is important to say that these are not empty places. They are being filled by agency and bank staff. Part of the reason for that is that people want flexibility and more pay, two of the things that we are trying to address so that we can provide more permanent contracts for those people who currently work flexibly.

The noble Lord, Lord Clark, and the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, talked about EU staff. I hope your Lordships will agree that I miss no opportunity to say from this Dispatch Box how much we value those staff and that they have just as much right to apply for settled status as anyone else in this country, provided they fit the criteria. However, it is worth pointing out that there are more EEA staff in the NHS than there were in June 2016. The one category where the figure is lower is in nursing and midwifery but the reason for that was the introduction of a more stringent language test. We are dealing with that issue, which I hope will mean that we continue to see an increase in EEA staff working in our NHS.

The noble Lord, Lord Willis, asked specific questions about the apprenticeship levy. I will need to write to him on that issue having consulted my colleagues in the Department for Education.

Turning quickly to the second point of the Motion, several noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, the noble Baronesses, Lady Walmsley, Lady Watkins and Lady Garden, and others said that we should postpone the introduction of the reforms until the post-18 education and funding review has been completed. As noble Lords know, the Prime Minister launched the review earlier this year to ensure that we have a better system of higher education support that works for everyone. Many aspects of the current system work well and, as was set out in the terms of reference for the review, there are important principles that the Government believe should remain in future. One of those is that sharing the cost between taxpayers and graduates is the right approach, as I rehearsed earlier in my speech.

I take the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, about looking at the Welsh example. I have looked at it myself and I am sure it is something that the review would want to consider. However, it is important that we do not prejudice the work of the expert panel established to support the review or prejudge its outcomes. The fact of the review should not delay these healthcare education reforms, not least because they predate the launch of the review by some distance and already apply to the vast majority of nursing students. We believe it would do more harm than good to further delay these reforms, although it is worth underlining that any relevant reforms stemming from the review will apply equally to this group of student nurses.

In conclusion, I recognise the well-motivated concerns expressed by noble Lords during this debate. However, I hope I have been able to demonstrate that the student finance reforms that this Government have introduced have allowed both the removal of the artificial cap on nurse training places and the largest expansion of student nursing places in a single year ever seen. These two facts are not coincidental; they are inextricably linked. The latter is possible only because of the former and they form part of a wider set of workforce reforms designed to expand, train and reward our nursing profession better so that we can continue to deliver the high standards of NHS care that patients demand. On that basis, I hope the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, will feel able to withdraw his Motion.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate, particularly the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins, who returned early from the WHO to take part in it.

I am left, though, with huge concerns and a real puzzlement as to the Government’s approach. As the noble Lord, Lord Willis, said, faced with this huge crisis in nursing in particular but also among the other professions covered by the regulation, the Government, without any evidence base, seem to be setting out a plan to discourage older women and people from black and minority ethnic groups from entering nursing, midwifery and other professions. In the breakdown of postgraduate healthcare students, the statistics show clearly that 64% are over the age of 25, women are largely attracted to this route and there is a higher percentage of minority ethnic students. We also know from the Department for Education’s own analysis that those groups are known to be more debt-averse. So the consequence is bound to be a negative impact on the very group of people we probably most need to come into the nursing profession.

The Minister justifies that by saying that loans are higher than bursaries. That is one way of putting it but, of course, bursaries are grants and loans are loans, and the fact is that to many people a debt is a debt. I really worry about the Government, who are seeking to say, “Don’t worry, you can run up a huge debt because the chances are that you’re not going to have to repay it”. The Minister has lectured me about economic policy in the past but I have to say that this is the most extreme example of “funny money” I have ever come across. He tried to reference it back to the Labour Government, but I remind him that we never intended that the amount of fees that would have to be paid would reach anything like what they are now. We believed in a shared responsibility; the current Government believe in transferring all responsibility to students.

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

I do not want to get into an argument about funny money and magic money trees, but it is worth pointing out that the proposal to treble student fees came from the Browne review, which was instigated by a Labour Government, and indeed the 2010 Labour manifesto committed a future Labour Government to implementing the findings of that review.

[Baroness Walmsley]

I would add that the Browne recommendations had no cap at all.