BPS responds to NHS People Plan

The plan, released early this morning, demonstrates the important triple role psychologists can play in supporting patients, staff and organisations.

In terms of patients, it is good to see continued investment in training to support significant expansion in the future mental health workforce and to support significant expansion in psychological therapies for children and young people.

And for staff, psychological welfare post-covid should be a high priority. Psychologists can support the national health and wellbeing programme and help drive the proposed pilots on improving staff mental health. They should be central to the resilience hubs currently being established./p>

And for organisations, the People Plan makes it clear psychologists will have a key role to play with the central themes of "more staff, working differently, in a compassionate and inclusive culture". 

Practitioner psychologists will be key to instilling behaviour change that paves the way for the desired culture shifts. While compassionate leadership, action on diversity, action on staff retention and establishing workplace planning processes are all central to the work occupational psychologists do in businesses up and down the country.

Sarb Bajwa, chief executive of the British Psychological Society, said:

"It is a testament to the great work of our members that psychology and the work of psychologists feature so much more prominently than in the Draft People Plan.

The wider psychological workforce will be integral to creating thriving NHS organisations that work both for staff and patients, it's excellent news that the People Plan recognises our work.

We are pleased to be working closely with NHSE and HEE, establishing ongoing collaboration to demonstrate the value of embedding psychology within the NHS and how this will help create the compassionate and inclusive culture the People Plan calls for."