Anne Main – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anne Main on 2016-10-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department has taken to encourage students to become ambulance service paramedics upon graduating.

Mr Philip Dunne

The latest available data from NHS Digital NHS Hospital and Community Health Service monthly workforce statistics shows that there are now over 2,200 more paramedics in the National Health Service than in May 2010.

As set out in Health Education England’s (HEE) 2016/17 Workforce Plan for England, planned paramedic training places have increased by 60%, to over 1,600. The workforce plan estimates that by 2020 there is likely to be an 11% growth in the available paramedic workforce.

HEE is partnering with the East of England Ambulance Service Trust, the University of East Anglia (UEA) and Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) to give aspiring paramedics the chance to gain the experience, skills and knowledge required to support applications for the Paramedic Science degree programme (BSc) at UEA and ARU for entry in September 2017.