And the winners are...

The winners of the prestigious Health Education England (HEE) National Widening Participation Awards were announced in a ceremony in London last night.

Now in its second year the awards celebrate, promote and recognise widening participation (WP) activities that give people from under-represented communities across the country access to health education and employment opportunities.

The 2017 award winners are:

Widening participation work exposure award

• Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospitals NHS Trust & Liverpool Clinical Laboratories

Research and Evaluation award

• Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health, University of Manchester

Participation Partnership and Collaboration award

• Salford Royal NHS foundation Trust and Salford City College

Health Ambassador/Mentor of the year award

• Hilary Whyatt, University Hospital of South Manchester NHS foundation Trust

Outstanding Contribution to Widening Participation award

• Bay Health and Care Partners - Careers & Engagement Hub

Sir Keith Pearson, Chairman, Health Education England who presented the awards said:

These awards showcase some of the best widening participation work in health in England.  We strongly believe in encouraging greater diversity within the health sector.

In 2015 we released our strategy ‘Widening Participation:  It Matters’. This sets out steps to ensure the NHS workforce is more representative of the communities it serves. A person’s ability and motivation is what should matter.It should not be their social background, or how extensive their social networks are. All of the awards recognise the breadth and diversity of activity that is being undertaken to widen participation.

We had many excellent nominations, and I really must thank the expert panel of judges who spent many hours reading the submissions before selecting our winners.

Widening participation is a major strategic priority within health supporting not only workforce supply and demand, but also the wider social mobility agenda across the country. HEE’s National Widening Participation Awards are a key part of this strategy as they recognise the achievements of some remarkable individuals and collaborative partnerships to support a future workforce and widen access to professional education.