Responding to the latest NHS performance data RCN General Secretary and Chief Executive Professor Nicola Ranger said:

“There’s been progress on NHS targets across the board and that is a huge testament to nursing staff who have worked under enormous pressure to deliver care for their patients. They have done so with a depleted workforce that has had little respite.

“But the job is far from done and patients and nursing staff alike will not thank the government if it now takes its eyes off the ball. The reality is that despite today’s better figures, patients are still coming to harm in an NHS which has too few nursing staff to guarantee safe and effective care. 

“Whatever happens in Westminster today or in the coming week this is a government that needs to rebuild trust and it can do so by investing in nursing.”

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