78 foreign nurses recruited by Wolverhampton hospital
Health bosses have identified almost 80 foreign nurses from Greece and Italy who will be taken on at a Black Country hospital.
The controversial recruitment drive at Wolverhampton's New Cross Hospital will see around 170 people hired from abroad to fill gaps in the hospital's staffing quotas.
In total, 44 nurses from the two European countries have been handed jobs, with a further 34 given provisional offers.
The new staff will begin work in the coming weeks after undergoing intensive English classes if their grasp of the language is not up to standard. A number of midwives are also being hired from Ireland as part of the recruitment drive.
Bosses announced the plans last year, although some claimed it was a shun to local nurses.
David Loughton, chief executive of the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust, said the recruitment drive was progressing well.
"We confirmed roles with 44 people and have offers in with 34 more," he said. All the nurses we've confirmed have passed their English tests. The recruitment drive is going well and we'll be taking on midwives from Ireland as well."
Initially nurses were going to be hired from India, China and the Philippines because of a shortage of qualified nurses in the UK.
This soon changed to southern Europe because of potential language issues.
The nurses will be paid a salary of £21,500, as is consistent with NHS guidelines.
Mr Loughton said earlier this year that the foreign recruitment drive was not an ideal scenario for the trust. His message to local nurses was: "If they're good enough I can assure them we'll have jobs for them."
He said the 170 staff being hired was a one-off.
Since 2009 to10, more than 3,000 annual nurse training places have been lost across the UK and around a quarter of all NHS trusts are now looking abroad for staff, figures show.
Around 15 per cent of New Cross' nurses leave each year, mostly due to retirement or taking jobs at other hospitals.
The recruitment drive follows criticism for the trust from national health body the Care Quality Commission. They demanded action be taken after a hospital inspection revealed that at night there was one registered nurse for every 10 patients.
New Cross was also criticised for its care for elderly patients and inspectors said the hospital 'must take action' to improve.
CQC bosses were concerned that older people's care, surgical and dementia wards were not sufficiently staffed.
