UK nursing crisis |
U.K. general elections set for June 8, much attention has been focused on the state of the National Health Service (NHS), whose winter crisis in 2016-17 was so severe that the Red Cross called it a "humanitarian crisis". A recent survey by the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) found that 78% supported strike action over the coming summer, while over 90% backed industrial action of other forms. Industrial action would require a formal ballot. The survey highlightsa grave situation facing the nursing profession. U.K. nurses went on strike only once (in 2014) in the past 134 years. A government-led austerity drive has capped public sector wage rises at 1% over the past two years and with freezes before that. RCN estimates that nurses have suffered an effective real 14% pay cut in the past seven years, leaving some nurses to turn to food banks. Also, the workload on nurses has increased substantially. A combination of factors has led to a severe staffing crisis. Around 40,000 nursing posts are vacant in England alone, exacerbated by changes in immigration rules that made it harder for nurses from outside the EU (India included) to come to Britain. Brexit could result in the nursing profession losing the tens of thousands of EU nurses who work in the NHS.
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