Really stupid?

That is totally untrue, for a fact Tony Blair came in to power in 1997! Project 2000 was bought in by the Tories in the late 80's early 90's and that is when university based training was introduced,. So please get your facts straight. HCA's are paid on band 3 and cleaners on band 1, so, again, get your facts straight please.

Thanks pp. It's very helpful to have the facts.

My pleasure.

Doesn't alter the main argument being made.

Do they have Enrolled Nurses and Registered Nurses in the UK. Seeing both my elderly mother and my grandson in hospital in the last eighteen months there was a huge difference in the amount of care they needed. My grandson after open heart surgery needed specialised nursing besides having his basic needs taken care of. My mother needed basic care, fed, bathed and toileted. I tried to find if the UK had the two types of nurses who have different roles that they have in Australia.

My youngest daughter has this year started a course as an Enrolled Nurse. She will spend four days a week at the local TAFE (technical and further education) with some hands on time time spent at the local nursing home and hospital in the nearest large town. She wants to eventually become a Registered Nurse but because her youngest is still young and only because she has my help with babysitting, she took the opportunity to at least get some study and experience under her belt and start as an EN. Then when her youngest starts school she will start her degree and becomes a Registered Nurse (RN). Some of her subjects that she will complete at TAFE will be accredited towards her degree.

Faye the SEN was phased out a long time ago. When I worked in the NHS in a psychiatric unit it was apparent that there were a lot of able SENs who were blocked from progression in their careers because you had to be SRN to get promotion to ward sister etc. I think that was one of the motivations behind introducing a single qualification.
I am still wondering whether the very long post above was written by seeker or whether he/she has copied and pasted it from somewhere (and if so where) - but seeker does not seem to have returned to the thread.

Wouldn't it make sense for those who wanted to progress in their careers to study further Jess. The EN course is only for four days a week for eighteen months. Achievable for those who want to do basic nursing. For those who are interested in specialised nursing further training and qualifications are necessary.

Yes it might Faye. It is possible that the other driver for change was the increasing technical skill and knowledge needed by nurses these days and that it was not considered a safe option to have "nurses" who could not complete many of the necessary tasks. My DIL is working in the private Australian system as a nurse educator (on the ward) and she (just) told me that the SEN's are sometimes terrifying because training is so basic that they have very little clinical knowledge or experience but they are expected to be able to do same tasks as other nurses. Big thumbs down from her I'm afraid.

That sounds as if they need more nurses, jess, rather than that the EN's aren't qualified to do the job they are meant to do. Yes, a lot of what might be called medical nursing is very technical nowadays, but we still need people who will simply look after the sick person's bodily needs when they can't do it themselves. At least, that's what seems to be lacking.

I've only ever been in hospital to give birth (and to visit people). Thirty-two years ago the nursing care given to new mums was, I felt, very good. Twenty years after that, when DD3 was born I wasn't impressed with the nursing care, though I was with the medical care. I think we need more nurses whose job it is simply to try and make people comfortable. I get the feeling from discussion on gransnet that that part of nursing has been forgotten quite often in favour of more technical know-how. Hospitals need both.

Biker has expressed what I was trying to say a whole lot better here.

However bags once you give someone the title "nurse" hard pressed managers, trying to staff a ward, will put in a "nurse" of any kind they can lay hands on.
If you have 3 "nurses" and 12 seriously ill patient some of those "nurses" will be asked to do higher level tasks, and not just basic care. The sort of thing I am talking about is a seriously ill patient that needs complex observations done several times per hour.
My DIL says that working in private hospitals in Australia as a casual nurse she has feared for her registration because there is so much work of this kind to do, you cannot possibly keep up and the chance of something going badly wrong is high. I suspect many NHS wards the same applies.
The issue is about resourcing and management - and politics - in terms of how much money there is - lies behind it. Going back to a solution like SENs that worked in a different world is not going to solve anything.

I understand and accept what you're saying, jess, but there remains a need for people doing basic traditional nursing jobs. If hospitals don't have enough staff to do all the necessary work, then that is the problem, not what the definition of what high tech nursing is.

Yes, it's about money – paying enough people, on various scales, to do the work that needs doing – and that is down to politics. If people don't want to pay enough tax to fund proper nursing, then they can't complain when it fails to materialise.

Tough on those who are willing to pay the taxes though

Yes I agree you need people to do the basic care bags who are competent and kind. Nurses need to ensure that these people are doing their tasks properly.
I don't know what the answer is bags.
The people who use most of the NHS resources are those who have multiple serious conditions from middle age onwards but carry on like that for several decades, not those who live a long and healthy life - they tend to fall apart rather rapidly in their late 80s or 90s . Unfortunately (for the NHS) there are increasingly more people who fall into the former category - those who would, previously, have died in middle age. I can only see this problem increasing.
Really interesting to find out about the two tier system that exists here in Oz.

I also agree with Bags thatBiker has hit the nail on the head and anyone who really knows anything about the true spirit of what nursing is supposed to be about will also agree. Well done Biker.