Our hospitals need more nurses and midwives

3rd April 2017

New figures published by Scottish labour today show that the number of unfilled nursing and midwifery posts has rocketed under the SNP.

Since 2011 the number of  vacancies for nursing and idwifery posts has increased from around 600 to over 2,500. That’s a more than 280% increase.

Even more worryingly, the number of long term vacancies – that show us how hard it is for our health service to fill these jobs – has increased by an even greater rate of more than 300%

How has this happened?

After a decade of SNP control our hospitals don’t have enough nurses and midwives. A key reason for that is Nicola Sturgeon’s decisions, as health secretary, to cut training places for nurses and midwives

Expert groups like the Royal College of Nursing said it was a bad idea at the time but the SNP pushed ahead and did it anyway

How is our NHS coping?

Thanks to the goodwill of NHS staff. The last NHS staff survey said that  only a third of staff think there are enough of them to do their jobs properly, meanwhile nine out of ten nurses believe their workload has got worse.

Our NHS staff save lives, care for others and do it all against a backdrop of ever increasing pressure. They need support.

What would Labour do differently?

Our workforce commission will deliver a solution to the SNP’s NHS staffing crisis.

It will look at how we can attract more people towards training for nursing and midwifery jobs and consider how to support more student nurses financially.

It will also consider how to scrap the 1% pay cap for NHS staff.

Our NHS staff are the foundations of our health service – we need to listen to them and support them.

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