To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of the (a) comprehensiveness and (b) adequacy of the figures he holds on the number of maternity support workers in the NHS in England.
Answered on
15 December 2022
No specific assessment on the comprehensiveness of data for maternity support workers has been made.
NHS Digital publishes Hospital and Community Health Services workforce statistics for England. These include staff working in hospital trusts and integrated care. This data is drawn from the Electronic Staff Record, the HR system for National Health Services (NHS) providers. Responsibility for data accuracy lies with organisations providing the data.
The data held and published are an accurate summary of the validated data extracted from the NHS HR and Payroll system. Data quality is monitored by NHS Digital, NHS Business Services Authority and NHS trusts themselves. NHS Digital seeks to minimise inaccuracies and the effect of missing and invalid data but responsibility for data accuracy lies with organisations providing the data.
NHS England have provided funding to maternity services to support the recruitment of Maternity Support Workers (MSW) and to offer enhanced education support to align them with the Health Education England MSW competency, education, and career development framework.
To increase the maternity workforce, from 2022, an additional £127 million is being invested by NHS England which will go towards the maternity NHS workforce and improving neonatal care. This is on top of the £95 million invested in 2021, to fund the establishment of posts for 1,200 more midwives and 100 more consultant obstetricians.