— PUBLIC INQUIRY CAMPAIGN
Nurses are dying.
The NMC must answer
for what it has done.
Justice for Nurses is a national campaign demanding a statutory public inquiry into the Nursing and Midwifery Council. The system that should protect nurses is destroying them. That ends now.
PRESS RELEASE
EMBARGOED UNTIL: Monday 20th July
JUSTICE FOR NURSES
Cross-Party MPs Back Parliamentary Push for Westminster Hall Debate and Inquiry into the Nursing and Midwifery Council
The Justice for Nurses campaign has secured cross-party parliamentary support for a formal Westminster Hall debate and a parliamentary inquiry into the Nursing and Midwifery Council, following a series of meetings at Westminster in June 2026.
Who is Regulating the Regulator?
The NMC regulates over 826,000 nursing and midwifery professionals in the UK. It is overseen by the Professional Standards Authority. In its most recent Periodic Review, the PSA found that the NMC met only 9 of 18 Standards of Good Regulation. Critically, it failed to meet Standard 15, the standard that directly governs fitness-to-practise processes. The question that this campaign is placing before Parliament is simple: who is regulating the regulator?
The NMC has not met Standard 15 since 2018/19. Standard 15 requires that investigation processes are fair, proportionate, and conducted as quickly as possible. Its continued failure is not a technicality. It is the standard under which nurses are left suspended for years, unable to practise, unable to earn, and in too many cases, unable to recover.
The Human Cost
Fitness to practise proceedings do not merely affect a nurse's registration.
They devastate careers, families, finances, and mental health. In the most tragic cases, they have cost nurses their lives.
• A nurse can be suspended from practice for up to 18 months before any finding has been made. There is no legal cap on total suspension. The NMC can apply to the High Court for repeated 12-month extensions. Nurses have been unable to practise for three years or longer without a single finding against them
• In 2024/25 alone, 691 interim orders were imposed on nurses and midwives, an 11 per cent increase on the previous year
• The NMC's own target is to resolve 80 per cent of cases within 15 months. As of December 2025, it was achieving this in only 73.3 per cent of cases, meaning thousands of nurses are waiting beyond this threshold with no certainty and no income
• Nurses consistently report financial devastation, the loss of their homes, relationship breakdown, and the complete destruction of their professional identity
• The psychological harm is profound and consistent across testimonies: anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress, and in the most tragic cases, the loss of life during or following proceedings
• A significant proportion of cases conclude with no finding of impairment, after years of proceedings, with no formal mechanism to address the harm caused
Parliamentary Support
MPs who have confirmed their support include Ian Byrne MP, Seamus Logan MP, Kim Johnson MP, and Andy Macnae MP. The campaign is building a cross-party coalition and calling on nurses and members of the public to write to their own MP. The campaign is seeking 18 MP signatures to secure a Westminster Hall debate, alongside calling for Layla Moran to ask for a Select Committee inquiry into the NMC. Contact your local MP by using our letter template.
Quote: Ishbel Straker, Founder, Justice for Nurses
Over a thousand nurses have signed our petition, and 160 have shared their stories in under two weeks. These are not statistics. These are nurses who have given their lives to caring for others and who have been broken by a system that claims to protect the public while destroying the professionals who serve it. The NMC has not met its own fitness to practise standard since 2018/19. Parliament must now ask: who is regulating the regulator?
What the Campaign is Calling For
• A Westminster Hall debate on NMC fitness to practise proceedings
• A submission asking Layla Moran, Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, to consider a select committee inquiry into the NMC and other professional regulators
• The establishment of an All Party Parliamentary Group on Professional Regulators, with the Regulatory Justice Foundation as secretariat
How to Get Involved
• Sign the petition by clicking here
• Write to your MP using the template letter - Download here
• Share the campaign and help ensure these stories are heard
Notes to Editors
About Ishbel Straker: Ishbel Straker is a Psychiatric Nurse Prescriber, serial founder, and television mental health expert. She is the founder of Justice for Nurses, the Regulatory Justice Foundation CIC, ISC Care Ltd, and Pause Wellbeing Ltd. She is a former NMC Expert Witness, a former Clinical Lecturer, and the developer of the UK's first national crisis line for blue light services. She has NMC fitness to practise proceedings of her own, originating from whistleblowing disclosures made in December 2020, with no finding of patient harm. PSA Standard 15: Standard 15 of the Standards of Good Regulation requires that fitness to practise processes are fair, proportionate, and concluded as quickly as possible. The NMC has not met this standard since 2018/19.
About the Regulatory Justice Foundation
CIC Company No. 17057980
RJF website: www.theregulatoryjusticefoundation.org.uk
Contact: regulatory.justice.foundation@gmail.com
Campaign website: www.justicefornurses.org.uk
18,060
cases affected by the NMC's 12-year process failure
4 MPs
engaged and calling for parliamentary accountability
PSA
Escalated concerns to the Secretary of State
— The case for inquiry
The NMC has failed nurses for over a decade
Nurses facing fitness to practise proceedings are enduring investigations that last years, sometimes a decade or more. Many lose their careers, their health, and their sense of self. Some do not survive.
🔴 18,060 cases were affected by a process failure the NMC concealed for twelve years
🔴 The Professional Standards Authority has formally raised concerns with the Secretary of State
🔴 Nurses under investigation are dying — by suicide, by the collapse of their physical and mental health
🔴 Whistleblowers who expose poor care are being referred to the NMC and destroyed by it
🔴 There is no independent oversight, no accountability, and no end in sight without external intervention
“I am one of the lucky ones. I have resources, training, and support. Many don’t. And some don’t survive. I am building the organisation I needed when my investigation started.”
”
— WHAT WE ARE DEMANDING
A statutory public inquiry into the NMC
We are not asking for a review. We are not asking for an internal report. We are demanding a full statutory public inquiry with the power to compel evidence, protect witnesses, and produce binding recommendations.
01
Independent investigation
A statutory inquiry independent of the NMC, DHSC, and any body with an interest in the outcome. With full powers to compel evidence and witnesses.
03
Protection for whistleblowers
Examination of how nurses who raise concerns about patient safety have been referred to the NMC and subjected to investigation as a result of speaking out.
02
Accountability for harm
A full examination of how many nurses were harmed, how the process failure was concealed, and who bears responsibility for the decisions made.
04
Binding reform
Recommendations with the legal force to compel structural reform of how the NMC operates, how it treats registrants, and how it is itself held to account.
— WHO WE ARE
A campaign. Not a bureaucracy.
Justice for Nurses is a public campaign. We are nurses, families, colleagues, and allies who have lived the consequences of NMC failure. We do not speak for the system. We speak against it.
Accountable through the Regulatory Justice Foundation CIC
Justice for Nurses is constitutionally accountable through the Regulatory Justice Foundation CIC (Company No. 17057980) — an independent body supporting regulated professionals and whistleblowers across all professions. The RJF provides governance, credibility, and the institutional backbone this campaign requires. Justice for Nurses operates with its own identity and voice. It is not RJF. It is a campaign RJF stands behind.
— GET INVOLVED
There are three ways to act today
CAMPAIGN
Sign the petition for a public inquiry
Add your name to the call for a statutory public inquiry into the NMC. Every signature counts. Share it with every nurse you know.
SHARE
Tell your story
Your experience matters. If you have been through NMC proceedings and are willing to share your story — we want to hear from you.
SUPPORT
Join our peer support community
Fortnightly online peer-to-peer meetings for nurses and regulated professionals under investigation. Free. Confidential. No referral needed.
ADVOCATE
Write to your MP
MPs need to hear from their constituents. We have a template letter ready. It takes five minutes and it makes a difference.
— SIGN THE PETITION
Add your name to the call for a public inquiry
The NMC will not reform itself. A public inquiry will not happen without public pressure. Sign below and share this page with every nurse you know.
Target: 10,000 signatures
— TELL YOUR STORY
Your experience is evidence
MPs and journalists need to hear what really happens inside NMC proceedings. Your story — shared anonymously if you choose — becomes part of the case for a public inquiry. Everything you share is treated with complete confidentiality.
🔒Confidential by default. You do not have to give your name. Your story will be stored securely and only used with your explicit consent. Nothing is published without your permission.
— ASK YOUR MP TO SUPPORT A WESTMINSTER HALL DEBATE
Download our template letter and ask your MP to support greater parliamentary scrutiny of the Nursing and Midwifery Council.
The Justice for Nurses campaign has secured cross-party engagement in Parliament following a series of meetings at Westminster in June 2026. The campaign is now seeking the support of Members of Parliament to secure a formal Westminster Hall debate and to encourage further parliamentary scrutiny of the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC).
We are asking supporters across the UK to contact their local MP and request that they support the call for a Westminster Hall debate. The campaign is also calling on the Chair of the Health and Social Care Select Committee, Layla Moran MP, to consider a Select Committee inquiry into the NMC.
Every letter sent helps demonstrate the strength of public and professional support for greater parliamentary scrutiny and accountability.