The Department of Health and the Department for Education and Skills today announced arrangements for the management of NHS training budgets by Strategic Health Authorities in England in 2007/8.
Funding of ?4.3 billion has been allocated for the training and development of the NHS workforce. This represents an increase of 3.6% over 2006/7 (excluding student grants).
A new service level agreement has been put in place between the Department of Health and the SHAs, setting out the priorities for investment of training funding. SHAs and Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) will be expected to work in partnership to ensure investment is effectively planned and based on long term workforce need.
Health Minister Lord Hunt said:
“This agreement represents a significant commitment to the training of our next generation of healthcare professionals. It is important that the NHS has the freedom to manage training so that workforce development reflects the healthcare needs of the local population. However we expect this agreement to put training plans on a much firmer footing so that the investment we have made will enable Strategic Health Authorities and their local universities to work together to produce a well-trained NHS workforce that can deliver improved patient care.
“We now have an agreement which links funding of training much more closely to workforce planning needs and gives greater long term security to universities. We expect future changes in training commissions to be based on an assessment of services required by patients and that SHAs will work in partnership with their local universities to achieve this.
Bill Rammell, Minister for Further and Higher Education said:
“This agreement underlines the importance of close partnership working between the NHS and HEIs. We know that some HEIs may still be feeling the effects of the savings which had to be made last year. We will expect SHAs to consider the impact of their decisions on the financial viability of HEIs, and to work towards implementing the agreed benchmark prices for their contracts with HEIs. In the longer term the service level agreement will lead to a more stable funding position for HEIs.
“I believe we now have an agreement where SHAs and Higher Education Institutions can work together to plan and provide high quality healthcare education for the NHS of the future.
Background on the 2007/08 MPET Allocation and SLA
The Multi Professional Education & Training (MPET) budget was created in 1996 and consists of the following three elements:
– Non-Medical Education and Training (NMET), the majority of which is spent on pre-registration training for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. This includes funding to universities for tuition costs, funding for trainee salary support and funding for bursaries.
– Medical and Dental Education Levy (MADEL), which supports the basic salary costs, and some non-pay costs, of junior doctors in training.
– Service Increment for Teaching (SIFT) to support the additional costs incurred by NHS organisations in providing clinical placements for medical and dental undergraduates.
The MPET budget was devolved to SHAs in 2006/07.