A top North East university has welcomed the government’s latest policy to increase medical school places across UK universities in a bid to boost NHS staffing levels.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced a Long-Term Workforce Plan for the NHS on Friday, June 30, that will see places on medical degrees at universities doubled to 15,000 by 2031/32.

The announcement also revealed GP places will increase by 50% to 6,000, as well as widening applications for adult nursing to 38,000.

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In the next fifteen years, universities will now see an influx of medical school students after a previously enforced cap of 7,500 places saw many hopeful doctors rejected from courses.

Head of the School of Medicine at Newcastle University, Professor Steve Jones, has welcomed the news considering the “pressure” the NHS is currently under due to staffing levels.

He said: “Many of us in the Medical School work within the NHS, alongside our roles in educating the doctors of the future.

“We see the pressure the whole workforce is under and very much welcome the plan to expand training numbers for all healthcare professionals.

“All Medical Schools have a government-set cap on the number of students they can take. Newcastle University has many more applicants than we are able to accommodate and, therefore, we have to decline applications from many who have the ability to succeed on our course.

“This was exemplified at last week’s Open Days, which were attended by more than 1,000 potential applicants for our 367 places in 2024.”

According to website Medical School Expert, the acceptance rate of medical courses across the UK sits at around 30%.

Applications in 2022 saw nearly 30,000 school leavers applying to study the course at university but only 7,500 were given places due to the cap – no matter if they achieved the grades required or not.

For universities like Newcastle, which is one of the largest medical schools in the UK, questions of expansion for many schools could be on the horizon to cope with increasing demand.

Professor Jones said: “Further expansion will be through some existing Medical Schools taking more students and new schools being created - Newcastle University will play its part in supporting this process. 

“We can be sure that if more places are offered at Medical Schools there will be sufficient, suitable applicants to fill those places.

“Numbers will not double immediately as it will take some time to open new schools. Existing schools will be considering how they can expand, support new schools as they prepare to open, and adapt their existing programmes as suggested in the plan.

“Newcastle, and a number of other Medical Schools, already have four-year graduate entry programmes. Patients can be assured that medical training is quality assured by the GMC so that all new doctors have reached the same standard even if the route, including length of training, varies.”

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At the press conference on June 30, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said the new 15-year plan is one that will “deliver the biggest ever expansion in the number of doctors and nurses that we train.”

He added: “You can trust this Government with the NHS. The plan rests on three principles, train retain and reform.

“First, training. We’ll double the number of medical training places by 2031, focusing on areas where there are too few doctors today, we’ll train over 24,000 more nurses and midwives a year and increase the number of GP training places by 50%.

“In time, this will allow us to reduce our spending on temporary agency staff by £10 billion and cut the need for international recruitment. Today the proportion recruited from overseas is around one in four – with our plan, it will fall to just one in 10.”