Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will consider suspending their consultation on how to implement grants and tuition fees for nursing, midwives and allied health professional healthcare students, and instead consult fully on a range of proposals that would best deliver a sustainable future workforce with access to high quality education and clinical training.

In the Spending Review 2015 the Government announced that from 1 August 2017, new nursing, midwifery and allied health professional students will no longer receive National Health Service bursaries and will move onto the standard student loans system.

The Government has set out its intention for these changes to be implemented in August 2017. Ahead of this, the Government will issue a public consultation on how we most successfully implement these reforms. The consultation will welcome a range of views from stakeholders, which the Government will consider before publishing its consultation response later in the year.