The cure’s simple

ONE in four hospitals doesn’t have enough nurses (Mail). The problem in recruiting and retaining is that they are chronically underpaid.

Why would anyone put themselves through years of training to be then paid less than a records clerk? The NHS is full of extremely well paid administrators who don’t have to deal with the responsibility or stress experienced by a frontline nurse.

Successive governments have paid lip service to nursing pay, safe in the knowledge that nurses are unlikely to go on strike, unlike teachers or London Underground drivers.

The solution to turning around the shortage of nurses is simple: pay them what they are worth.

IAN HUTTON, Nantwich, Cheshire. DOES a nurse need a degree (Letters)? My granddaughter is in her second year at university studying to be a paediatric nurse and most certainly does not spend all her time in lectures.

She has lectures for a total of 12 weeks a year in two blocks. The rest of the time she is on the wards working unpaid.

The main difference between today’s student nurses and their predecessors is that when my granddaughter qualifies she will have a debt of almost £40,000, made up of £9,250-per-year tuition fees and £ 4,000- per- year maintenance loan, which is supposed to cover living expenses.

In fact, her parents have to find £1,500 for her rent, plus a weekly allowance to cover expenses. Is it any wonder there is an acute shortage of nurses in the NHS?

However, my daughter and son-inlaw are happy to fund her training when they see her eyes light up when she talks about her time on the wards working with sick children.

M. SHeArSON, Oldham, Gtr Manchester.