To ask the Minister of Health (i) for his assessment of staff shortages in the frontline health and social care sector; (ii) to detail the areas most affected; and (iii) to detail the steps being taken to address the shortages.

I am acutely aware of the impact of staff shortages across the whole health and social care system, including on front line service provision. Health and social care organisations are under unrelenting pressure to deliver safe and effective care. This has been exacerbated over the recent period by the pandemic and the associated increased levels of absence due to sickness and self-isolation of staff.

The following table shows the latest published figures on HSC vacancies (at 31 March 2022). There were 6,778 HSC vacancies actively being recruited to, equating to an overall vacancy rate of 8.1%. The largest number of vacancies (2,067 – 9.9%) related to registered nurses and midwives, while the highest vacancy rate was for social care workers (10.3% – 997).

Source: HSC organisations

Similar challenges exist in the independent social care sector with, for example, continuing staffing pressures in care homes having knock on effects in delayed hospital discharge.

Action to address operational staff pressures is led by health and social care employers who have developed frameworks to address these issues. The starting point is seeking targeted additional voluntary resource, which can take the form of additional bank shifts, voluntary redeployment and, where necessary, employment of agency or locum staff.

Active recruitment to permanent HSC Trust vacancies is proceeding at pace. This is targeted at existing trained staff, newly qualified professionals, and doctors and nurses who have joined the HSC through our successful international recruitment programmes. At 31 May 2022, 1,023 international nurses have been recruited and remain in post. I approved a further phase of international nurse recruitment in February 2022. This has the potential to deliver a further 3,000 international nurses over the next five years, subject to the provision of the necessary funding.

In November 2021 I announced a support package of up to £23m to enable social care employers to offer improved rates of pay and attract staff for the domiciliary care and care home workforces. To date, there has been positive feedback on how this additional funding has helped to stabilise the sector and supported recruitment and retention. Despite a very challenging financial position, I have prioritised funding this year to continue supporting this sector. Long-term, transformational change is needed in this essential area and is the subject of the current consultation on the Reform of Adult Social Care (26 January 2022 – 1 July 2022).

Growing our overall workforce supply to meet anticipated future demand is our long-term aim and we can point to significant progress in some areas. For example, since 2015/16 the annual number of pre-registration nursing and midwifery university places commissioned by my Department has increased by 88%; from 710 to an all-time high in 2022/23 of 1,335. This is a hugely significant investment in our future workforce.

However, much more needs to be done. Accordingly, on 8 June 2022 I published the Second Health and Social Care Action Plan setting out a challenging range of measures to train, recruit and retain healthcare staff to ensure that we have a workforce of the optimum size and with the right range of skills. Growing the local supply of healthcare workers depends upon the availability of significant, sustained, recurrent investment in pre- and post-registration education and training. Current levels of funding are wholly inadequate and the one year funding cycle the Department has had to work under seriously constrains a proper assessment of affordability and frustrates long term investment in these areas.

It is therefore essential that my Department has a multi-year budget to produce a three year education and training budget plan.

Restoration of the Executive is essential, so that the difficult, long-term decisions about the prioritisation and allocation of finance for investment in the healthcare workforce can be made.