Refreshed Violence Prevention and Reduction Standard
On 3 December 2024, NHS England published a refreshed Violence Prevention and Reduction (VPR) standard, updated from the previous 2021 version. This was developed with the SPF, alongside integrated care systems and NHS organisations, and encourages a public health, trauma-informed approach to preventing and reducing violence and understanding the root causes of distress.
The standard delivers a risk-based framework that supports employers to create a safe and secure working environment for NHS staff. Employers can now assess themselves across seven domains and use a red, amber and green rating to identify areas to action and measure progress over time. The refreshed standard includes a new assessment and improvement action plan tool and updated guidance.
We encourage all NHS employers to implement the standard in partnership with trade union colleagues.
The SPF will work with NHS England in the Workforce Issues Group to support the implementation of the standard.
Alan Lofthouse, acting deputy head of health at UNISON and co-chair of the SPF’s Violence Reduction Subgroup, made the following statement in response to the launch of the refreshed standard.
‘Taking steps to prevent and reduce violence in the workplace should be at the top of every leader’s agenda. Violence has such a wide impact on our people, our services and our patients’ experiences suffer if prevention work is not done. The real costs of violence go well beyond just the financial costs.
More can and should be done to share best practice and encourage greater consistency across NHS organisations to reduce the risk of violence. The NHS needs to go further than legal compliance with the Health and Safety at Work Act.
This is why the NHS Violence Prevention and Reduction Standard is so important. It gives NHS organisations the tools to apply a focussed approach more consistently to prevention, high-quality risk management, effective use of data, a reporting culture, and collaborative working to provide safer workplaces.
The Standard is jointly owned by NHS England and the NHS Social Partnership Forum. This gives our staff sides the confidence and ability to be involved in partnership to help organisations use the Standard to measure and improve their current response to violence.
NHS staff should never accept incidents of violence as ‘part of the job’ and should be encouraged to report all incidents and near misses. With the large and complex systems that staff work in, NHS Leaders can, and should, take steps to provide, strategic direction and accountability as this makes a real difference.’
Read more on preventing violence and abuse against NHS staff on our violence reduction web page.
