Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment the Government has made of the impact of NHS real terms pay cuts on levels of NHS workforce retention in the last 12 years.

Pay increases in the public sector, including for staff working in the National Health Service, are determined through the independent Pay Review Body process. In reaching its recommendations, the Pay Review Bodies consider factors such as retention, motivation, affordability and inflation.

Since 2010, the stability index, which measures the percentage of staff employed within the Hospital and Community Health Service (HCHS) at the beginning of the period and who remain employed in the HCHS at the end of the period, has remained stable between 89.7% and 87.4%. The NHS Retention Programme seeks to understand why staff leave in order to target interventions to support staff to stay whilst keeping them well. All NHS trusts have tailored retention programmes focusing on career development and training pathways to retain staff.