Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many health visitors were employed in (a) Greater London and (b) the London Borough of Newham in each year since 2010.
NHS Digital publishes workforce statistics and the following table shows the number of health visitors employed in Greater London and the London Borough of Newham at 30 September 2010 to 2016. Data for May 2017 is also provided as this is the latest available.
The number of health visitors employed by National Health Service organisations and reported through the Electronic Staff Record (ESR) shows a reduction to previous recent years. However this is not a complete picture of the health visitor workforce who may also be employed by non-NHS organisations including social enterprises, private sector organisations and increasingly the local authorities themselves. There is no complete picture of this workforce so it is not possible to tell if the reductions reported through ESR are real reductions or simply transfer of employment to non-NHS organisations and the below table should be interpreted with this in mind.
NHS Hospital and Community Health Services (HCHS): Health visitors in NHS trusts and clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) in Greater London and the London Borough of Newham as at the last day of each specified month
Full-time equivalent | September-2010 | September-2011 | September-2012 | September-2013 | September-2014 | September-2015 | September-2016 | May-2017 |
Greater London | 1,074 | 1,056 | 1,118 | 1,193 | 1,411 | 1,639 | 1,556 | 1,450 |
of which: London Borough of Newham | - | - | 36 | 39 | 37 | 54 | 3 | 3 |
Source: NHS Digital, Provisional NHS HCHS monthly workforce statistics.
Note: Data for the London Borough of Newham relates to those employed by NHS Newham CCG and Barts Health NHS Trust.