Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to her Department’s contract Securing a Diverse Future for the NHS, procurement reference CF-2038900D0O000000rwimUAA, if she will make an assessment of the adequacy of the diversity in the NHS workforce.

The National Health Service has a diverse workforce. Latest data published by NHS England shows that as of June 2023, 27% of staff working in NHS trusts and other core organisations reported being from an ethnic minority group, compared with 18.3% of the United Kingdom’s population as shown in the 2021 Census. Over three quarters of staff working in NHS trusts and other core organisations are female.

However, there is always more that can be done, on these and other types of diversity. The contract ‘Securing a Diverse Future for the NHS’, which is being delivered by The Prince’s Trust, aims to bring people from more diverse backgrounds into the NHS, particularly people from areas of higher deprivation.