Figures reveal that only 51 full-time NHS midwives have been hired within the past year. Head of Health and Social Policy at the Royal College of Midwives said: “Last year the Conservatives committed to deliver 3,000 more midwives for the NHS frontline.
“Today’s official workforce figures reveal however that the NHS is adding midwives at a rate of just one per week, and that’s across the whole of England. At that rate, the Conservatives will take over half a century to deliver on their pledge, until we’re well into the 2070s. That’s not good enough.”
In the last quarter of 2018, figures show that the number of shortlisted nurses and midwives who got the job had gone down from 69% in the previous quarter to 59%.
O’Sullivan also said: “Money must reach the NHS frontline”.
Full story in Nursing Notes, 30 July 2019