22.03.12
NHS workforce falls by nearly 20,000
The NHS has experienced the biggest overall fall in staff in ten years, the NHS workforce census has revealed, as numbers fell by 19,799 in 2011.
Clinical support and infrastructure support staff numbers decreased, while the number of professionally qualified clinical staff increased slightly, by 254.
Published today by the Health & Social Care Information Centre, the census showed that there were 1,350,377 people working for the NHS on September 30, 2011 – a decrease of 1.4% on the same time in 2010.
The number of managers and senior managers dropped by 8.9% and hospital and community health service nurses also fell by 3,411, although numbers are still up on ten years ago.
Overall, there are still 21.8% more people working for the NHS than were a decade ago, meaning there has been an average annual increase of 2% since 2001.
Health and Social Care Information Centre chief executive Tim Straughan said: “The report shows the fall in the NHS staff numbers is primarily in non-clinical, particularly managerial, posts.
“Most categories of professionally qualified clinical staff saw increases in their numbers – although nurses saw a small decline but numbers are still up on ten years ago.
“The number of managers and senior managers fell 8.9% in the year to September 2011, though again, numbers are still up on 2001 levels.”
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