Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what additional (a) security and (b) other staff are planned to be recruited to deliver the zero tolerance approach towards violence against NHS employees.

Employers across the National Health Service in England are responsible for protecting their staff and it is for them to decide locally whether they need any more security or other staff to address and manage challenging behaviours.

The new Violence Reduction Strategy will help NHS organisations support their staff by ensuring they receive appropriate training, for example in de-escalation techniques and what to do if they are attacked or abused, improving the safety of the environments in which they work and ensuring local security management specialists who are appointed by trusts locally maintain their skills and knowledge through continuing professional development.

The use of body cameras is being piloted by a few ambulance trusts to assess their effectiveness in protecting paramedics.