The CfWI will revisit this thinking after the Government response is published, with a specific focus on how we may further support health and social care leaders in identifying workforce implications.

This CfWI paper is not intended to replace an individual’s own reading and consideration of this landmark report (with its executive summary, three volumes and around 1800 pages); it is intended as a distillation of the 290 recommendations from a workforce perspective. We agree that there is much to learn from the narrative of the report and a great deal to reflect on in terms of people’s own work, attitudes and collective culture (Francis 2013, Executive summary, para 111).

The fifth and final annual report of the NHS Workforce Review Team (WRT) report covers April 2009 to March 2010 and also looks ahead to the end of June 2010.

On 18 January 2011 the House of Commons Health Committee published the Third Report of Session 2010–11 entitled ‘Commissioning’.

The report followed an inquiry by the Health Committee which sought evidence from the Secretary of State for Health, Andrew Lansley MP on 15 December 2010 along with Department of Health officials. The Committee’s report and the issues that it raises have been carefully considered.

This paper sets out the Coalition Government’s response to the Health Committee’s Third Report of the Session 2010/11.

Click here to view the response.

The vision set out in the white paper Equity and Excellence: Liberating the NHS can only be achieved if healthcare providers employ staff with the skill mix appropriate to deliver a high quality service to patients in every circumstance.

Public investment is central to securing high quality services and training. In future the DH will have progressively less direct involvement in planning and development of the healthcare workforce, except for the public health services.

Employers will be given greater responsibility for planning and developing the healthcare workforce. Local ‘skills networks’ of employers will take on many of the workforce functions currently discharged by Strategic Health Authorities, while the quality of education and training will remain under the stewardship of the healthcare professions.

The final date for responses to this consultation is 31st March 2011. A summary of the response will be made available before or alongside any further action, such as laying legislation before Parliament, and will be placed on the Department of Health consultations website. This will occur after the consultation is completed on 31 March 2011.

To view some of the key diagrams from this consultation document in more detail click on the below links:

• Workforce Planning, Education & Training: Main Functions
• A new framework for planning and developing the workforce
• Distribution of multi-professional education and training funding (MPET)

Public Health England will be created as a service that gives more power to local people over their health, whilst keeping a firm national grip on crucial population-wide issues such as flu pandemics.

The White Paper, Healthy Lives, Healthy People also sets out how funding from the overall NHS budget will be ring-fenced for spending on public health – a recognition that prevention is better than cure. Early estimates suggest that current spend on areas that are likely to be the responsibility of Public Health England could be in the range of £4 billion.

The majority of public health services will be commissioned by Local Authorities from their ring-fenced budget, or by the NHS, all funded from Public Health England’s new public health budget.

These briefs and policy summaries were prepared at the request of the Belgian Federal Public Service–Health, Food Chain Safety and the Environment, for the Belgian EU Presidency Ministerial Conference on ‘Investing in Europe’s health workforce of tomorrow: scope for innovation and collaboration’.

These documents can be viewed here.

All parts of the health service are required to work across organisational boundaries to respond positively to the reform set out in Equity and Excellence: Legislation for, whilst ensuring that service quality and financial performance are maintained and improved at a time of change.

Click here to view the Operating Framework.

The King’s Fund set up a commission on leadership and management in the NHS with a brief to:

• take a view on the current state of management and leadership in the NHS
• establish the nature of management and leadership that will be required to meet the quality and financial challenges now facing the health care system
• recommend what needs to be done to strengthen and develop management and leadership in the NHS.

The future of  leadership and management in the NHS: no more heroes reflects the conclusions of the commission’s work.

The conclusions challenge some of the negative attitudes towards managers, as well as current plans for major reductions in management and administration costs. The commission believes that the NHS needs to move beyond the outdated model of heroic leadership to recognise the value of leadership that is shared, distributed and adaptive. In the new model, leaders must focus on systems of care and not just institutions and on engaging staff in delivering results.

The commission emphasises the contribution of both general managers and clinical managers to leadership, the fact that leaders exist at all levels – from the board to the ward – and the increasing importance of leadership across systems of care as well as in individual organisations.

The simulation exercise enabled senior managers and thought leaders from across the NHS, local government and the third sector to test out a remodelling of the health and social care system in a safe learning environment.

Routes for social and health care: A simulation exercise focuses on Crafton – a hypothetical metropolitan borough in central England – and sets up a number of routes to managing change.

The publication offers some important reflections for policymakers, commissioners and providers, including

• the challenge of moving beyond short-term efficiency savings to longer-term transformational design of services
• the  tension between top-down managerially led approaches to change and a more devolved outlook that stresses individual control and choice
• the potential of health and well-being boards to offer system leadership in moving towards different models of care.

The independent NHS Future Forum report confirmed that there was support for the principles of reform, but that some of the ways in which the Government was putting those principles into practice could be improved.

This Department of Health publication sets out the Government's detailed response to the Forum's report. It explains how significant changes will be made in line with the Forum's recommendations.

The proposed health and social care reforms will lead to the creation of a number of new key bodies, along with changes to, or the abolition of, other NHS and arm’s length body (ALB) employers, as well as changes to the Department of Health (DH). The HR transition framework outlines the principles applying to the HR and employment processes supporting the potential transfer of functions and roles and appointments to the new and affected bodies.

The framework provides the guiding standards relating to employee movement from ‘sender’ (current) to ‘receiver’ (new or changed) organisations at a national and sub-national level.