THE government has ignored more than 20 warnings of a health and care staffing crisis, the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) has said in a statement.

Alarms have been sounded at least 10 times in the last year alone, with numerous warnings made since 2016 while the NHS faces the real prospect of being unable to deliver its legal commitments, the union says.

Health policy experts, politicians and watchdogs have repeatedly flagged up the workforce crisis “engulfing” the sector, the RCN says, calling for changes to the Health and Care Bill going through Parliament to enable the issue to be tackled.

Workforce numbers needed to deliver services should be published regularly, and a senior nurse should sit on the boards of new regional health and social care organisations, it says.

RCN acting general secretary Pat Cullen said: “With ministers gambling on lifting Covid-19 restrictions and NHS waiting lists apparently set to soar to up to 13 million, the public cannot be put at risk a moment longer.

“We went into this pandemic with almost 50,000 nursing vacancies in the UK and the true scale of the shortage is unknown.

“The government has a once-in-a-lifetime chance to fix this problem and help a severely depleted workforce.

“If it doesn’t take this opportunity, it won’t even have the capacity to deliver the law as it is currently set out.”

Unite national officer for health Colenzo Jarrett-Thorpe said: “Unite has been warning for years about the looming recruitment and retention crisis now engulfing the NHS as it battles the rising number of infections due to the latest wave of coronavirus.

“Exhausted staff are at breaking point. A substantial pay rise would go some way to staunching the staffing crisis, but in the longer term a more sophisticated workforce planning model needs to be developed by ministers so the health service does not lurch from the recurring recruitment crisis year after year. 

“The accelerating privatisation of the NHS is not helping as services become fragmented and profit-hungry private healthcare companies look to make savings.

“It is not too late: we call on new Health and Social Care Secretary Sajid Javid to change course and tack to preserve and strengthen our beloved NHS.”

The Department for Health and Social Care has been asked to comment.