TINA DONNELLY
THE skills and expertise of our public service workers is our most important resource.
The 1% cap on pay make the prospects of recruiting and retaining our resource a low priority for the UK government.
Modernising our health service means looking after its staff.
Paying nurses an adequate wage is a major way to entice returners back into the profession and retain the ones that are already there.
If morale is low because of low pay, inflexible working conditions and feeling undervalued, modernisation suffers and so does the quality of service for patients.
The number of experienced nurses leaving the profession has doubled across the UK in the last three years as the strain on the NHS and its staff has become unbearable.
Nurses that leave take years of experience and skills out of the health service.
Research shows that a strong nursing workforce reduces complications and increases recovery times for patients.
It has even been proven that when nurses are given greater control in organising patient care, death rates can be reduced by 5%.
Let’s be clear. Sustainability of the nursing workforce in health and social care is a major problem. Not enough nurses are being trained, recruited and retained.
This puts an unacceptable pressure on nursing and health care staff and threatens the quality and safety for delivery of services, as well as health outcomes.
Nursing is a global profession and since its founding in 1948 the NHS has benefited enormously from foreign-trained health professionals. Wider international recruitment into the UK has been cyclical, intensifying after periods of insufficient investment in training, recruitment and retention of UK nursing staff as well as a failure to undertake long-term workforce planning, often despite evidence of impending shortages.
Unfair and low wages are an added burden on workforce planning and international recruitment.
The role of the nurse has expanded greatly over the past years, where nurses are now responsible for the prescribing of medications, complex medical procedures, advance life support techniques, and front line assessments to name but a few.
The activity that is nursing requires the utmost skill and knowledge and this in combination with an attitude of heart and mind supports people in need of help.
The knowledge required by nurses takes years of study and commitment.
At the present time, nurses undertake a bachelor’s degree of three years duration.
After qualification, nurses are expected to continue to develop and learn at their own expense throughout their careers.
While a meaningful pay rise will not on its own alleviate the challenges to recruitment, retention and morale, it will provide a strong and welcome signal to the workforce.
We call on the NHS Pay Review Body to support us in calling for a comprehensive workforce strategy to co-ordinated approach to pay, terms and conditions, workforce supply, training and development, career progression, working environment and job design, health and wellbeing at work and staff management.
Tina Donnelly is the director of the Royal College of Nursing in Wales