Further Flexing? Issues of Employment Contract Flexibility in the UK Nursing Workforce

Abstract

This paper, based on research commissioned by the Royal College of Nursing (Buchan, 1995), reports on the changing working patterns and flexibility in the employment of nursing staff in the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK. It reviews relevant literature, examines official data and draws information from 12 case study NHS trusts. Flexibility is invariably portrayed as a good thing, and as a means to a positive end, yet is rarely defined in detail, if at all. The aim of this paper is to consider flexibility not as a slogan or panacea, but in terms of the rationales for, and likely effects of, changing patterns of nursing work. It examines the reasons why NHS employers have been attempting to increase the flexibility of their nursing workforce.