We can have Brexit or the NHS. We can't have both, says @campbellclaret. https://t.co/n1bGaWozqu
— The New European (@TheNewEuropean) November 11, 2017
Brexit is destroying the NHS…no more EU staff, disaster!….says melodramatic spin doctor Alistair Campbell….
The NHS was ‘the silver bullet’ the anti-Brexit campaign needed, ‘because it is becoming clearer and clearer that we can have Brexit or the NHS but we can’t have both’. Heed those words. Polling published here last week showing growing concern that Brexit may be damaging the NHS suggests the public sense that is right.
It is not just about money, of course. There is staffing. The day we met, the Nursing and Midwifery Council reported a 67% rise in the number of EU nurses and midwives leaving the register compared with the same period the year before. Dr House said there had been a 96% drop in EU nursing applicants – there is a nursing recruitment crisis in mental health by the way – in the 12 months following the referendum. Recently I spoke for the Time to Change mental health campaign at Kingston Hospital, Surrey, where 13% of the medical staff are from the EU. They’re not all going home, but some are.
So the NHS is to be weaponised, a ‘silver bullet’ that is sent to destroy the evil Brexit monster. The BBC is happily onboard with such fantasies, peddling them for all it’s worth. Trouble is…it’s all fake news.
The proportion of EU nationals leaving jobs in the NHS is rising, while the share of those joining is shrinking.
The BBC analysed NHS Digital figures, which showed the trend in England over the past two-and-a-half years.
Health experts say the UK’s decision to leave the European Union in June 2016 was behind the trend.
So the BBC and the EUseful idiots like Campbell are telling us this…EU staff are fleeing the NHS……due to Brexit….
But is that true in the slightest? No, of course not. They give grim warnings about 10,000 EU staff leaving the NHS but fail to mention the 13,000 that joined…..never mind more Brits and non-EU staff. The NHS has more staff now than in June 2016….
The headcount was 1,187,298 in July 2017. This is 1,699 (0.1 per cent) more than the previous month (1,185,599) and 21,076 (1.8 per cent) more than in July 2016 (1,166,222).
The BBC even admits way down the report that its headline is hugely alarmist and misleading as we have more EU staff and the number of nurses we are short from the EU is relatively minute….
Overall, the NHS says there are around 3,200 more EU nationals working in the NHS than at the time of the referendum, as the size of the health service continues to grow.
Over the same period, there has been a slight reduction of 162 nurses, which it suggests may be down to the Nursing and Midwifery Council introducing new language requirements in January 2016, making it more difficult to be eligible for employment.
So how does that merit the headline…
Share of European Union staff leaving NHS rises following Brexit
The Mail took the BBC’s reporting apart [as did Mark Tinsley here]:
MAKING OF A BREXIT LIE
It’s an alarming refrain constantly repeated by Remainers, the BBC and the Guardian: that the Brexit vote has caused a staffing crisis in an NHS heavily reliant on EU workers. One problem – the story’s utter hokum, as this forensic investigation proves.WHO could not be worried by the news that the number of EU doctors and nurses working in Britain has plummeted over the past year?
Of all the developments attributed to Brexit, few have more power to scare the public than the idea that the NHS is crumbling for want of medical staff who have been put off coming to work in Britain because they no longer feel welcome here.
Radio Four’s flagship news programme, Today, nine days ago led with the news that there has been a ‘drop of nearly 90 per cent’ in EU nurses registering to work in Britain over the past year.
Listeners were left in no doubt as to the reason: Brexit.
Yet it simply isn’t true that Brexit has caused a staffing crisis in the health service. This is all a big lie which the
Remain lobby keeps repeating as part of its propaganda campaign against Brexit.
Contrary to what these doomladen reports imply, the NHS’s statistics show that the overall number of EU citizens working in the health service has actually grown since the Brexit vote.
[I will post the whole of the Mail’s article in the next post as it is too big to post here and in its web form is hard to read.]
I looked over the figures and the facts and they’re right…the BBC, Guardian and fellow EU cheerleaders are spinning us a big lie…..any shortfall in nurses has little to do with Brexit.
This chart shows the truth…an overall rise in EU staff since June 2016, more doctors, more clinical support staff and only a drop of 0.1% in nurses…..
Here’s what the Institute for Employment Studies says in a government report….non-EU recruits are better qualified, speak better english and tend to stay in the job far longer than EU recruits…and EU recruits have dropped off due to new tests and because, in essence, we have drained the EU of health staff who in any case now have better opportunities in their own countries as their economies improve…and note that in 2015 the NHS planned to recruit more from non-EU countries….before the referendum:
Volumes of recruits in European countries were often significantly lower because some of the European economies, which had supplied nurses to several NHS trusts in recent years, were now doing a little better economically, reducing the supply of potential recruits. Second, there were anecdotal reports from interviewees that the European market had already been exhausted, particularly in places like Italy and Spain, where there has been heavy recruitment from some NHS trusts in recent years, and from places like Portugal, which already has a shortage of nurses. This is in contrast to the Filipino and Indian job markets, which are characterised by an oversupply of skilled nurses who are encouraged to seek posts abroad. As two trusts reported:
In Europe, we might look to get a maximum of 20 [nurses] now, whereas in the Philippines, you could get 80-100.
(NHS Trust, London)The only way you get volume that you need… you get it from universities or you go abroad. The commissions are low and so going abroad is the only option.
Reported advantages of recruiting non-EEA nurses over EEA nurses
Trusts also reported other advantages of recruiting non-EEA nurses over EEA nurses. In line with this, the 2015 NHS Employers survey indicates that 56 per cent (83 trusts) have plans to actively recruit from non-EEA countries in the next 12 months.Trusts and expert interviewees reported that non-EEA nurses from India and the Philippines (the two largest suppliers of non-EEA nurses to the UK) were also often more experienced and had better English language skills than some EEA nurses because these foreign workforces tended to be characterised by highly skilled nurses with good levels of spoken and written English. English language skills were thought to be increasingly important among the trusts and experts we spoke to because of the Nursing and Midwifery Council requirement, as of January 2016, for nurses from the European Union to pass an International English Language Testing System (IELTS) exam before they start working in the UK. All trusts anticipated that this would significantly reduce the numbers of potential recruits from the EEA, if not diminish them altogether. One trust went as far as to suggest the new IELTS exam would almost remove Europe as a viable alternative for them to recruit any new nurses, saying:
I don’t think anyone will go to Europe anymore after these [exams] are introduced because it will yield even fewer potential recruits. This will mean that the time and expense of European recruitment will be the same or even greater than foreign recruitment.
(NHS trust, London)Trusts also reported generally better retention among non-EEA recruits, than among EEA recruits.
European nurses are easier to get in [to the UK], but harder to keep, whereas foreign nurses are harder to get in, but easier to keep.
The issues that the NHS faces have nothing to do with Brexit.
Sooner or later in this country, someone must stand up and make a startling assessment of the NHS, and ask for answers to some fundamental questions:
1. What do we as a country want/ expect from the NHS?
2. Can the country actually afford that expectation?
3. If not, what is affordable that will address the needs of all citizens?
4. How can we adequately manage the shortfall?
We absolutely must stop chucking money in with limited expectation of improvement, its time to start measuring outputs against financial contributions rather than continue a pissing match as to who will tip most money in.
Anne Widdicombe was spot on when she said (and I paraphrase) that the NHS was almost unfit for purpose the day after it was born. She pointed out that at the time, it was created on 3 major assumptions:
1. That stamp (NI) would cover its cost
2. That whilst the population would grow, it would grow on a manageable basis, and
3. That illnesses and their treatments would not change fundamentally.
All three assumptions have proven to be no longer true.
The Left in this country have perpetuated the lie that more money will solve everything, and yet most can now see this will never be the case. It will require someone of monumental gonads to stand up and argue the case, but the fact is that as far as the NHS is concerned the status quo is no longer good enough.
No
Nobody in politics can speak honestly about the NHS. Before I go on – personally – I would find a way to make it self funding – private – if it means the same thing.
But if a conservative wants to debate it there is an assumption that they want to cut funding.
If it is labour the assumption is more spending and interests of the unions at heart.
So there can be no debate.
Al Beeb won’t say anything negative about al Beeb because everyone is a hard working angel. A few might be but the majority ? Hospitals stop at weekends – agency staff trained in the nhs funding their second or third jobs. Consultants lining their pockets. Junior doctors dreaming of Australia or Canada . Plenty doing that – private outpatients being put at the top of nhs waiting lists. No challenge to that corruption.
I read beveridge every once in a while – it’s not very long thankfully – but the current version is a long way from the original aim. I am free to say this I do not have dependents and if I ever need it I know how far down the list I will be .
If I could go private I would but from my experience they are just nhs quacks with credit card readers.
Alan, first class analysis proving yet again that the BBBC are not disingenuous, do not muddy the waters and are not duplicitous – they LIE. Time and time again. This must be like shooting fish in the proverbial and I imagine you must hanker sometimes for more challenging gist. That Campbell survived the shameful dodgy dossier debacle and is still considered a worthy commentator says all you need to know about the calibre and character of those involved in the EU mouthpiece rag.
Hon
It’s strange that any one should listen to Campbell – he has mental issues and a bullying self righteous self serving attitude. If he is not in the pay of the Eu – through Blair perhaps – he sure would like a place on their gravy train scoffing British taxpayers cash like so many.
Further reductions in NHS nurses from everywhere will be care homes moved from the NHS to the private sector , which means the nurses staffing those homes move from NHS to private .