It’s just over a week since the end of RCN Congress 2026 and I want to start by thanking all of you involved in another wonderful few days in Liverpool. It was so important to get together for such insightful debates, brilliant speakers and excellent learning events.

I was so inspired by everyone who attended, not least our wonderful speakers - Margaret Aspinall, Kevin Fong, Dame Jasvinder Sanghera, as well as Dr Pamela Cipriano and Mozhdeh Ghasemiyani, talking about the Girl Child Education Fund - all had such important stories to tell, which I know resonated with everyone there. If you weren’t able to attend you can view the full programme and catch up on the RCN website here. 

I was also delighted to address Congress in my keynote speech for the third time – and I want to repeat here how important it is for all of us in the nursing profession to keep valuing ourselves and our colleagues, as well as working to help others understand the value of nursing. 

And Congress is always a powerful reminder that the Royal College of Nursing is the voice of our profession - and that it is your voice that drives us. We had hundreds of student nurses with us in Liverpool and we heard their voice and passion throughout the week. We know nursing is an amazing profession - one for life. But to get off the starting blocks, you need more. That’s why in my speech I launched our five priorities on what we’re demanding from governments, employers and higher education to make things better for nursing students.

The debates we have at Congress lead to really important work for the College and we’ve seen the amazing work that’s happened on Corridor Care and Protect the title of Nurse over the last few years following on from Congress resolutions. 

And just yesterday, in response to the RCN Congress 2023 resolution on suicide prevention and the need for compassionate workplace cultures, we launched Supporting Compassionate Practice Environments, a new framework to help teams create working environments where compassion can be sustained day to day. You can read more on that in the blog by Dr Stephen Jones, Head of Nursing Practice, here. 

Another theme of Congress was about the shift from treatment to prevention, a move that needs significant investment to make it a success. Our survey of health visitors and school nurses has shown that half of health visitors are struggling to deliver essential health checks to families with children due to understaffing and a lack of funding. 

This means vital health support is being missed, and that the failure to invest in key children’s nursing roles – specifically health visitors and school nurses – will lead to serious long-term public health problems. It’s a ticking time bomb for public health and the choice for governments is simple: invest in prevention or store up problems for later in life.

Another issue I know has been important for our Members over recent years has been about nursing regulation being fit for purpose – and this week we saw the latest in a catalogue of failings at the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) come to light after it admitted it had failed to consider criminal convictions and health concerns in line with its own processes over a period of 12 years. 

The NMC must ensure all those practising as registered nurses are safe to do so at the point of registration and throughout their careers – that should be a bare minimum. Nursing continues to be the most trusted profession in the country, but our regulator is once again severely undermining this trust. And yesterday’s report from the Professional Standards Authority provides a further damning indictment of the NMC, finding that it meets just half of the standards expected of a regulator. The official verdict is that performance is getting worse and that is of serious public and professional concern. 

To finish I’d like to highlight a couple of new ways in which you can be involved with the work of the RCN. At Congress I announced our new RCN Ambassador roles - we need you to be the voices in your workplace, role models for the profession and to promote the Royal College of Nursing. Find out more information on this new, exciting role and how to apply here. We have also just launched our RCN Job Evaluation Representative roles – to support the February announcement on career progression for band 5 nurses working in the NHS in England. Job evaluation reps will ensure members are supported through that process – find out more here.