NHS bosses defy ban on woke jobs

NHS bosses are advertising a dozen well-paid ‘equality, diversity and inclusion’ jobs – more than two months after being told to stop recruiting for ‘woke’ positions.

In early June, then Health Secretary Sajid Javid launched a stinging rebuke at NHS top brass, saying there were ‘too many working in roles focused solely on diversity and inclusion... we must spend every penny on patients’ priorities’.

Currently there are 12 ‘ED&I’ roles advertised on the main NHS jobs website – all posted within the last month.

Three have salaries that could top £60,000, with eight paying at least £40,000. Together, the 12 jobs will cost between £474,236 and £540,827 a year.

Some of the posts advertised serve overwhelmingly white areas. They include ‘Head of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion’ at St Helens & Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, on the outskirts of Liverpool, which will pay £56,164 to £65,262.

The trust serves 360,000 people in the predominantly white working-class area, and its latest annual report states: ‘Our communities are not ethnically diverse but do have high levels of deprivation.’

Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust, which provides mental health and disability services across the North East of England, is seeking an ‘Involvement and Lived Experience Diversity Officer’ – a role paying up to £40,588. The advertisement states it wants to develop a ‘workforce in our services that are inclusive, equitable and reflective of our communities including race, religion, sexual orientation, age, disability and gender’.

The North East is the least ethnically diverse of England’s ten regions, with 95.3 per cent of people saying they are white.

CNTW chief executive James Duncan said: ‘This post will reach out into communities across the trust to ensure we are inclusive and ensure a contribution from all of the communities we serve.’

Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust is after an ED&I Engagement Coordinator who is ‘passionate about inclusion and diversity’, paying between £32,306 and £39,027. Cornwall is 98 per cent white.

St Helens & Knowsley and Cornwall Partnership did not comment.