Jessica BirdIn light of Government plans to improve NHS waiting times and overhaul the patient treatment experience, experts have highlighted health service staff as an important starting point.
Trade union Unite welcomed the commitment to investment in the NHS from the Government “after so many years of neglect,” but drew attention to staffing levels and employee wellbeing as key challenges that should not be ignored.
Sharon Graham, general secretary at Unite, said: “NHS workers are on their knees struggling to cope with current demands, which are at an all-time high.
“To simply expect the existing staff to do even more is both unacceptable and unachievable.
“The Government’s plans to cut waiting lists will only be successful if it puts resolving the real issues faced by NHS workers at the centre of its plans.”
The union warned that the Government must ensure that its reforms are not allowed to become an opportunity for the private sector to generate excessive profits from the taxpayer.
Graham added: “New investment will need to be carefully monitored and spent wisely.
“All too often in the past we have seen extra spending for new NHS initiatives disappear into the pockets of the private sector without any real benefit to patients.”
Prof Phil Banfield chair of the British Medical Association council, agreed that the plan was “a welcome sign that ministers are serious about giving this country the healthcare service it needs.”
However, he added that without addressing workforce challenges, the change needed would be impossible.
Banfield said: “To make significant and lasting inroads into the existing 7.5 million waiting list backlog, more is needed than relying on the good will of exhausted staff or new technology.
“Funding for hospitals and GPs to recruit and retain doctors and the modernising of facilities to utilise their skills efficiently and effectively, are priorities to deal with the chronic burnout that has created the current workforce crisis.
“Only when the Government has laid out its concrete steps to fully support the NHS workforce can we be confident that they have a plan which can achieve this target.
“Everything is possible when doctors, as the medical profession, are fully engaged and on-board, which has sadly not been the case across the last government.
“I look forward to sitting down with Government to agree the practicalities of how to make this aspiration a reality.”
