Standards are lower, nursing boss admits

England's most senior nurse told the public inquiry into Stafford Hospital that nursing standards in the NHS have deteriorated.

Chief Nursing Officer Dame Christine Beasley told the Francis Inquiry yesterday that "nursing had lost its way". She also delivered a warning on the current round of NHS reforms, telling the hearing that the NHS was in a period of "heightened risk" as the Government changes the system and demands £20 billion of savings.

She accepted that the events at Stafford and other scandals in the NHS showed there was "a very significant proportion" of hospitals with problems and added: "It certainly was more than one or two rogue organisations."

She labelled it a "national phenomenon" but she denied it was "endemic" or that nursing was "in crisis". She blamed the fall in standards on the need to rapidly recruit new nurses into the NHS after the 1990s when there had been poor investment by the then Conservative government.