Finding hope: The final report of the IPPR health and care workforce assembly

Article

England’s health and care sector is in a deep workforce crisis.

This is not because we have less staff overall. Rather, it’s because of a growing and sustained mismatch between worker-demand and worker-supply.

A vicious cycle emerged during austerity and worsened through the pandemic. Without transformational productivity gains, this mismatch between activity and demand means greater workload and pressure on each individual health and care worker.

We need a long-term vision for the future. In creating that vision, there are few better sources than workers themselves. In 2021/22, IPPR recruited a workforce assembly – across the NHS, social care, and unpaid care – to define a new vision for health and care work. Through assembly deliberations and further research, we have developed these principles into a 10-point policy plan for the future.

Related items

  1. A flood warning sign, on a closed country road next to water logged fields in the Avon Valley, Hampshire, England

    Adapt or die: Why progressives need to deal with extreme weather

    The impacts of extreme weather are already directly affecting people and communities across the UK. We lack ways to deal with this. 
  2. The outside of the BBC building in London with people walking in front of it

    Levelling the playing field: The BBC, Big Tech, and the case for a bold charter

    The upcoming charter renewal is the moment to give the BBC the resources, freedom and mission it needs to engage with technology firms on its own terms.
  3. A lighthouse shines a light into a dark seascape at the edge of a cliff on the coast of Wales

    Britain's strategy for a decade of danger: Our nation, our continent, our world

    Britain's foreign policy needs a grand strategy that clearly defines the country’s strategy for security, growth and migration.