I’ve been reflecting on my time as RCN President so far, and what a brilliant experience it has been to meet so many of our members since I started at the beginning of 2025. One of the incredible things to see is how far our reach goes - RCN members are everywhere. On every ward, in every clinic, in every corner of the UK. 

Over the last few weeks, I have been to several Onam celebrations around the country, so I want to start by wishing a happy Onam to those celebrating. It has been great to celebrate with colleagues from Kerala working in all fields of nursing. I also want to take a moment to recognise East and South East Asian Heritage Month - it is so important to celebrate the communities within the UK that make such a vast contribution to the nursing profession.   

And what an impact we can have if we all work together. When we make our voices heard we can really make change happen for the nursing profession. I’ve been so proud of how you have made your voices heard just this month on issues like corridor care and pay and our students shaping the future of the profession. And I will continue to make sure your voices are heard by governments and decision makers.  

It is vital for us to celebrate the contribution of the nursing profession – and one way we can do this is through our annual RCN Awards – nominations are now open for 2026. So please take this chance to recognise and celebrate your brilliant nursing colleagues who embody the excellence and commitment that drive our profession forward. If you live in Scotland, or London, we have other awards open for nomination now too. Please do get involved. 

Just last week we joined more than 70 health and care organisations in writing to the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care Wes Streeting to offer our considerable expertise as part of the development of the 10 year workforce plan in England. And that goes for the development of health and care plans across the UK – we stand ready to help shape the nursing workforce for the future.  

Our work on corridor care has been a big feature of my time at the RCN. And the recent announcement of an investigation into corridor care by the Health Services Safety Investigations Body shows the importance of our campaigning across all four nations on this issue. However, something that has really concerned me recently is that patient safety is not prioritised. The role of nurses in ensuring patient safety and patient outcomes, seems not to be valued and the focus is about money.    

Wherever you work, you absolutely deserve to be properly rewarded for your safety-critical role. I welcome the Westminster government’s ambition to shift resource from acute settings into the community. But a fully funded general practice workforce is key to this and so along with the BMA, we’ve told the UK government that we need promised pay uplifts for GP nursing staff now. 

But when nursing staff are routinely moved from their normal wards to other wards at short notice, to cover staffing gaps, it demonstrates nursing is being undervalued and risks patient safety. It’s frustrating to see this happening with no consideration for the highly skilled and highly educated professionals involved. I haven’t seen a neurosurgeon asked to cover a dermatology clinic, but we expect a neurosurgical nurse to help out in a dermatology ward. That is why the RCN is committed to ensuring there is safe and effective care, our nursing workforce standards set out what is required to achieve this. And if you are concerned about patient safety you can find more info here about how to raise concerns with your employer.  

On Friday (5 September) we signed a joint letter with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and other organisations, about medical evacuations of children from Gaza. Plans to evacuate critically ill children for treatment in the UK are not happening quickly enough as attacks on Gaza continue. We are urging ministers to ensure the evacuation process for NHS treatment is based on clinical urgency and not financial or political considerations – every second counts.  

There is so much happening across the nursing profession right now, but we remain hopeful for change. We are here to support our members, over 500,000 of you, across the huge range of work that you do. I hope that you will continue to campaign with us, because that is how we will achieve real change for our brilliant profession.