Catherine West – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Catherine West on 2016-05-25.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to improve the recruitment and retention of paramedics employed by the London Ambulance Service.

Ben Gummer

We are advised by London Ambulance Service NHS Trust (LAS) that during 2015/16 it recruited 717 frontline staff. In doing so, LAS achieved its recruitment target and filled all its available frontline posts.

We understand that LAS has put in place a number of measures to help it support and retain staff. These measures include updating the vehicle fleet and re-launching the trust’s learning and development function. LAS has also established a new clinical team leader role, with 50% of the role devoted to supporting staff.

Demand on the service has increased significantly over the past five years. During March 2016, demand was the highest on record for patients with serious and life threatening illnesses. LAS continues to work to improve services for patients by focusing on reducing demand, recruiting more staff and supporting staff to work more efficiently.