What is really going on in politics? Get our daily email briefing straight to your inbox Sign up Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email

Stressed nurses are leaving the NHS in increasing numbers after 160,000 quit in five years.

Long hours and poor pay have been blamed for the numbers leaving increasing by a fifth.

An unprecedented NHS staffing crisis has left at least 40,000 unfilled nursing posts in England alone and wards having to close due to dangerous understaffing.

Data released by Government shows 33,530 quit the profession in the year up to September 2017.

This is a 17% increase on the 28,547 who quit in 2012/13 after year-on-year increases for the last four years.

In total 159,134 nurses have quit the NHS in the last five years.

The data was released in response to a Parliamentary question by the Labour Party.

(Image: Getty Images Europe)

Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth said: “In the past eight years of Conservative Government, the nation’s nursing shortage has gone from bad to worse.

“The Government’s disregard for nurses and years of squeezed wages are forcing good people out of the nursing profession.

“The critical shortage of nurses in the NHS is a threat to patients across the country.

“Labour in Government would give nursing staff the support they need to provide the best possible quality of care to their patients.”

It comes after we revealed last week that the number of GPs retiring early has doubled since 2010 causing waits for appointments to soar.

There are an estimated 100,000 staffing vacancies across the NHS.

Janet Davies, general secretary of the Royal College of Nursing, said: “This paints a very bleak picture about the state of nursing in the NHS.

“After years of pay cuts and underinvestment, we are haemorrhaging the best professionals. It is heart-breaking to see.

“Nursing is shrinking at the very moment it must be expanded at scale and pace.

“The Government knows patients can pay the highest price when there aren’t enough nurses.

“It must redouble its efforts to deter nurses from feeling no choice but to leave and make sure it’s an attractive career to the tens of thousands of young people it needs.”

The number of EU nurses coming to work in the UK fell by 90% in the year up to September 2017.

The Government has axed the nursing bursary meaning students now have to rack up thousands of pounds of debt.

(Image: Getty)

After the bursary was withdrawn new applications for nursing degrees fell by 10% last year.

Sara Gorton, head of health for Unison, the trade union with the most members in the NHS, said: “The growing strain on the NHS is so great it’s no wonder so many nurses are walking away for less pressured jobs elsewhere.

“But this seemingly endless exodus of experience and dedication comes at a huge cost, especially as there’s too few new recruits joining to take their place.

“Ministers must bring back the bursary before a whole new generation is deterred from taking up careers in the NHS.”

The total NHS workforce, including nurses, is slowly increasing but nowhere near enough to keep pace with rising demand.

Latest data for December shows there were 285,272 full-time equivalent nurses and health visitors working in hospitals and the community in England.

For example two people working half a week each would add up to one full-time equivalent job.

A national recruitment drive has been hampered by a damaging public sector pay squeeze lasting almost a decade.

This has meant NHS staff being thousands of pounds worse off in real terms since the Tories came to power.

Trade unions also highlight increasing stress and unsafe workloads for the nurses who remain.

Last week it that, despite chronic hospital bed shortages, 82 wards hosting almost 1,500 beds were being “mothballed” because there was no-one to staff them.

Total nurses and health visitors has been falling in England since October down from 287,147.

It has increased 3,795 since October 2010 but critics argue this is nowhere near enough to keep pace with rising demand.

Some nurse categories such as those on hospital wards have increased while other categories have seen a fall.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “Since 2010 there are nearly 47,000 more NHS staff, including over 12,900 more nurses on wards, so we would naturally expect to see a small rise in leavers.

“We know nurses have never worked harder which is why we recently announced they will receive a pay rise of between 6.5% and 29% in a deal backed by the Royal College of Nursing.

“We have expanded nurse training places by 25% underlining our commitment to making sure the NHS has the nurses it needs both now and in future.”