NHS Bursaries

Debate between Sarah Wollaston and Wes Streeting

Wednesday 4th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab)]

I thank the shadow Health Secretary and the shadow Health team for securing this important debate this afternoon, which effectively gives us the opportunity to debate early-day motion 1081, which is set to become the most popular early-day motion in this Session of Parliament. It has been signed by Members from across the House, including Government Members, because of the concerns that people have bravely shown about the potential consequences of the Government’s proposed decision on the NHS bursary.

As I have argued before in Adjournment debates on the Floor of the House and in Westminster Hall, what we are debating this afternoon is the biggest shake-up in the funding of nursing, midwifery and allied health subjects since 1968. It was announced, without adequate evidence and planning, as part of the Chancellor’s Budget rather than being a carefully thought-through policy proposal; that is why the Government are consulting people only through a technical consultation rather than through a consultation of all stakeholders on the principle of the policy, as they ought to have done.

Although I and others will refer to “student nurses and midwives” as shorthand, it is important to acknowledge, as my hon. Friend the shadow Health Secretary did, that this will affect students of all sorts of subjects and vital workers being trained in a range of aspects of the NHS—physiotherapists, occupational therapists, chiropodists, dieticians, podiatrists, radiographers, paramedics, prosthetists and others. That is why more than 100 right hon. and hon. Members signed the early-day motion and thousands of members of the public have spoken out through the online petition.

At present, nursing, midwifery and allied health subjects are not subject to tuition fees and students on these courses receive a non-means-tested grant of up to £1,000 a year as well as a means-tested bursary of up to £3,191 a year. That recognises that students of these subjects have to work considerably long hours during their courses—not just in the libraries and lecture theatres like most students, but on clinical practice as part of a full 24-hour care cycle. Indeed, it is estimated that student nurses work at least 2,300 hours across the course of their degree. I am not sure that many of us with degrees in this House could claim to have put in so many hours when we were at university. We should recognise the effort that such students need to make to secure their qualifications.

Those who work outside course hours to fund their degrees can end up working up to 60 hours, and we should not expect them to do so: it can have a deleterious impact not just on their academic studies but on their approach to clinical practice. Under the Government’s proposals, the changes will mean that students of these subjects will be charged tuition fees in excess of £9,000 a year and, as a result, will be burdened with £51,600 of debt. They will begin paying that back as soon as they graduate, which means that nurses will take on average a pay cut of £900 a year.

As if that were not unacceptable enough on its own, will the Minister explain when he winds up how it can possibly be fair that under the proposed approach there is no recognition in the student support system of the unique demands placed on these students? The NHS bursary, as it exists, alongside the tuition fee remissions that these students effectively receive, at least recognise that for many of the students it is difficult, if not impossible, to take on the sorts of part-time work that I did when I was studying, either during my A-levels at McDonald’s or during university at the now-defunct Comet. For those students, it is simply not possible to fund their degrees in that way.

The student support system should recognise that it is more expensive to study these subjects and that the opportunities to earn extra income on top of taking the courses are not as readily available as they are for other students. It is a real mistake for the Government not to recognise that in their plan.

[Dr Wollaston]

Does the hon. Gentleman also accept that there is a serious problem with hardship on the existing bursaries, particularly given that the amount of the bursary drops in the final year?

[Wes Streeting]

I am grateful for that intervention. I shall come on to thank some of the people who have been in touch, but I will never forget the very first conversation I had with a student nurse in my constituency who sat with me in the Members’ area of Portcullis House and cried because under the existing system she struggled to meet the costs of training to be a nurse, even with the NHS bursary currently provided.

I want the student support system to be more generous for these students because other students like my constituent have dreamed of being a student nurse. It is not right that financial support, or the lack of it, should be a barrier to their taking on this valuable vocation, which does so much for so many.

The Government’s policy is riddled with risk. Earlier the Minister challenged my assertions on mature student numbers. It is a fact that in the wake of the introduction of the coalition’s reforms to higher education, there was a fall in part-time and mature student numbers. The Minister claimed that there were record numbers of mature applicants to higher education; I can only assume that he was referring to last year’s figures. We should not identify a trend from one year’s figures, not least because UCAS figures for the 2016 application cycle published on 4 February 2016 show an increase in 18-year-old applicants, but a fall in most other older age group categories. I am more than happy to look at the data and conduct an evidence-based debate, but let us have an evidence-based debate and not take one year’s worth of figures and claim that there is some sort of trend.