Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many (a) mental health and (b) learning disability nurses were employed in the NHS in each year from 2010 to 2020.
NHS Digital publishes Hospital and Community Health Services (HCHS) workforce statistics. These include staff working in hospital trusts and clinical commissioning groups but not staff working in primary care, local authorities or other providers.
The following table shows the number of mental health and learning disability nurses, full time equivalent (FTE) employed in the National Health Service as at September each year along with the latest figure as of July 2020.
| Mental health nurses (FTE) | Learning disabilities nurses (FTE) |
September 2010 | 40,247 | 5,137 |
September 2011 | 39,024 | 4,667 |
September 2012 | 38,135 | 4,311 |
September 2013 | 37,397 | 4,035 |
September 2014 | 36,581 | 3,776 |
September 2015 | 35,671 | 3,577 |
September 2016 | 35,488 | 3,442 |
September 2017 | 35,390 | 3,305 |
September 2018 | 35,835 | 3,234 |
September 2019 | 36,696 | 3,186 |
July 2020 | 37,421 | 3,217 |
Source: NHS HCHS monthly workforce statistics, NHS Digital - July 2020
Notes:
Mental health and learning disability service provision is also commissioned by the NHS from private sector providers. The figures do not reflect staffing in the private sector.
Further information, including on different methodologies for counting the mental health workforce, is published by NHS Digital at the following link: