Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the net increase in junior doctors through recruitment to the NHS is in the last 12 months.

NHS England publishes Hospital and Community Health Services (HCHS) Workforce statistics and General Practice Workforce statistics publications for England. These show that as of December 2023, the latest data available, there are 80,123 full time equivalent junior doctors working across HCHS and general practice settings in England. This is 4,505, or 6.0%, more than in December 2022.

It is not possible to report how much of this net increase is new recruitment, as the figures will also include movements of staff coming in and out of active service for reasons such as career breaks or maternity leave, and the impact of movements in staff working part time.

Junior doctors have been defined as those working in National Health Service trusts and other core organisations, who are recorded in the grades Foundation Year One, Foundation Year Two, Core Training and Specialty Registrar, and also those working in training grades in general practice.