The UK and Phillipines Nurses

The UK has been heading for a major shortfall in nurses for decades.

The main reasons are that the salary and hours are atrocious for the level of responsibility they have to show. The more the government interfered in budgets and training, the worse the nurses felt and any just left their vocation and some went into private work putting much unneeded strain on the county’s National Health Servie (NHS)

Record numbers of nurses are leaving Britain to work abroad in search of better pay and affordable housing.

Fears are growing that many of the foreign recruits brought here to ease desperate Health Service staff shortages are among those quitting for other developed countries such as the U.S. and Australia.

There is evidence that Filipino nurses, who have been the target of big recruitment drives by NHS trusts and private care homes, are applying for jobs in America in the hope of making a better life.

The latest figures show a rise of almost 20 per cent in the number of foreign healthcare employers making checks on UK-based applicants, taking the inquiry rate to a ten-year high.

More than 6,000 checks were made in the year to March 2001, compared with 5,083 in the previous year, according to figures from the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC).

In previous years the most popular overseas destinations for nurses have been Australia, New Zealand, the U.S. and Ireland.

NHS chiefs are still hiring nurses from the Philippines, despite the scandal of Victorino Chua, the Mail can reveal today.

As the killer nurse’s trial unfolded at Manchester Crown Court, teams of recruiters were flown 7,000 miles to try to persuade scores of his compatriots to fill vacancies in two of Britain’s biggest hospitals.

After the conclusion of the case, police expressed concerns that Chua came to Britain on the back of suspect nursing qualifications.

But British hospitals are still trying to recruit hundreds of nurses from the Philippines, with offers of salaries of up to £25,000 a year, life insurance cover and free flights and accommodation.

In 2013, the Nursing and Midwifery Council suspended the recruitment of foreign nurses from some countries, including the Philippines, because of fears some recruits were using fake documents to land jobs here.
There are 23,000 Filipino nurses working in the UK. Roughly half work in the NHS, while the rest work in privately run hospitals and nursing homes. Nurses in the Philippines earn as little as £1,500 a year.

The Mail has footage of dozens of Filipino nurses listening intently to a sales pitch given in March by a senior NHS official at the Manila HQ of Omanfil International Manpower Development Corporation, one of the main recruiters of nurses in the Philippines on behalf of the NHS.

During the presentation he gave candidates some interview tips.

It recruits on behalf of King’s College Hospital and University College Hospital, London. It has also provided nurses for London’s Whittington Hospital and Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridgeshire.

In February, Omanfil invited applicants for nursing vacancies at King’s College Hospital. Omanfil is supposed to screen candidates before they are interviewed.