Dishonest to promise more nurses under Boris Johnson
Responding to the Conservative Party manifesto commitment to 50,000 more nurses, Liberal Democrat Shadow Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Social Care Luciana Berger said:
"It is dishonest to promise there will be more nurses under Boris Johnson's Conservatives. Our NHS has been consistently hit by the Conservatives' NHS and social care cuts, putting the lives of loved ones right across the country at risk.
"It is insulting to the public and all those who work in the NHS for Boris Johnson to celebrate the return of nurse bursaries. It was the Tories who scrapped them in the first place.
"What the Tories have actually promised at this election is to tax our nurses. By extending the Immigration health surcharge and immigration visa fee to EU health professionals, more and more of EU nurses will see little reason to stay here in the UK. Our NHS currently relies on 20,000 EU nurses, 10,000 EU doctors, and we've already lost more than 5,000 EU nurses in the last 2 years.
Lib Dem Parliamentary Candidate for South West Wiltshire, Ellen Nicholson said "There is no timeframe or workforce plan to realise this ambition, bearing in mind we already have 43,000 vacancies and it takes over 3 years to train a newly qualified nurses and 5 years for a doctors, this plan is not going to happen any time in the near future.
"A Liberal Democrat government will introduce a national NHS recruitment strategy and ring-fence £7 billion a year through putting a penny on the pound on income tax. Only the Liberal Democrats will stop Brexit and build a brighter future for our NHS and those who work in it."