Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to address the shortage of NHS staff in rural and understaffed areas.

The Government recognises the importance of expanding the National Health Service workforce, particularly in parts of the country which are understaffed, including rural areas. The NHS Long Term Workforce Plan (LTWP) commits to doubling the number of medical school places, with new medical schools and additional places in geographical areas with the greatest staff shortfalls. Further medical expansion will build on the impact of five new medical schools that have already opened in historically hard-to-recruit rural and coastal locations in Tyne and Wear, West Lancashire, Essex, Lincolnshire, and Kent.

The LTWP also sets out an aim to further adjust the distribution of postgraduate specialty training places, so that more medical students carry out their postgraduate training in parts of the country with the greatest shortages. Doctors are more likely to settle and practice in the areas they train. Therefore, expansion of places will help to address the need for more staff in these areas.