The nursing regulator will be rolling out new equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) training to help change the “toxic culture” at the organisation.
EDI advisor Mac Alonge from The Equal Group was brought on board by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) in October, in the wake of a damning review into the regulator, published in July 2024.
“Improvements need to be made over the long term”
Mac Alonge
The review by consultancy firm Rise Associates and led by solicitor Nazir Afzal found a “toxic culture” at the NMC, characterised by racism, bullying and other forms of discrimination.
The NMC last week announced that Mr Alonge, who was initially brought on for a three-month period, would continue working with organisation until the end of April 2025.
Since his appointment, Mr Alonge has been working with the NMC’s executive board and council to ensure their decisions are given the right level of scrutiny and challenge from an EDI perspective.
He said he was “looking holistically” at what needed to be done at the NMC, who needed to do it and how to start holding people to account for making the improvements required by the independent culture review as well as the organisation’s commitment to “wider cultural transformation”.
Mr Alonge and his team from the Equal Group had been reviewing and improving NMC policies to ensure that they were understood and used correctly.
He has also presented the council and executive with his recommended next steps, which include six new EDI learning modules to be rolled out in 2025.
These will cover EDI fundamentals; conscious inclusion; inclusive communication; accessibility, sensitivity and inclusion; EDI for leadership; and EDI policies and procedures.
Training will be rolled out to all staff including line mangers and senior leaders at the organisation.
Mr Alonge said that he had seen how committed people at the NMC were to meeting the current EDI challenges.
“One of the positives has been just how keen people are to engage with the topic of EDI at the NMC. This is an opportunity to demonstrate how effective equality, diversity and inclusion can be,” Mr Alonge said.
He added: “Improvements need to be made over the long term and I will engage with the new interim chief executive and registrar, Paul Rees, about his expectations and priorities.”
Paul Rees
Last month, new interim chief executive and registrar at the NMC Paul Rees announced that he would be presenting a plan for change for the organisation by the end of March 2025.
Mr Rees acknowledged that he was joining the NMC at a challenging time in its history, and said that the NMC’s processes needed to be “faster, fairer and more effective”.
Mr Rees also stressed that change would need to happen quickly.
“Given the challenges we face, I want us to change at pace,” he said. “I look forward to helping transform the NMC into an organisation that leads with fairness, inclusion and excellence.”
