One million people are estimated to have left the United Kingdom due to Brexit. Here is a quick snapshot of some workforce problems. Comment is Freed analyzes the personnel shortage in the public sector:
Childcare: I don’t see how the government’s proposed expansion of childcare will be possible at current average wage levels to compete with retail [employment]. The only alternative would be to open up our immigration system for lower-paid jobs and I don’t imagine either the Tories or Labour will be keen to do that. Likewise re-joining the [EU].
Nurses, meanwhile, are dealing with much higher demand, with full hospitals, and particularly intense pressure on A+E and intensive care. Exhaustion and burn-out from the pandemic are rife. Those who worked in intensive care during covid suffered post-traumatic stress disorder at similar levels to soldiers returning from Afghanistan.
Medical doctors: [UK] medical school places are artificially constrained by the Treasury due to their high cost. Demand has risen much higher than the increase in these places – the NHS has 17% more junior doctors since 2019 and 10% more consultants. The only way to square the circle has been a massive increase in non-UK doctors. Almost 11,000 doctors from outside the EU joined the workforce in 2021, up from 5,000 in 2017. This compares to around 8,000 UK trained doctors. This spike in recruitment also meant 50% of nurses who joined the NHS last year were non-EU.