NHS: Agency Workers
(asked on 11th January 2023) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much and what proportion of NHS funding was spent on agency staff to fill staff shortages in each of the last five years.
The following table shows the agency spend in total for the years 2016/17 to 2020/21. Data for 2021/22 is not yet available.
Financial year | Total employee paybill | Total agency spend | Agency costs as a percentage of employee expenses |
2016/17 | £50,619 million | £2,935 million | 5.8% |
2017/18 | £52,302 million | £2,407 million | 4.6% |
2018/19 | £54,968 million | £2,401 million | 4.4% |
2019/20 | £60,840 million | £2,380 million | 3.9% |
2020/21 | £67,700 million | £2,436 million | 3.6% |
The deployment of a temporary workforce is an important element of efficiently running the National Health Service, allowing the NHS to meet demand fluctuations without the need to increase capacity above that which would be required on a sustained basis. Staff can be drawn from internal staff banks or external agencies.