NHS Scotland Global Citizenship Programme: Equality Impact Assessment Results

2. Background

The NHS Scotland Global Citizenship Programme aims to increase NHS Scotland’s global health contribution by making it easier for all NHS staff to participate in global citizenship, both here in Scotland and overseas.

The role of the Programme is to:

a. Create the conditions for a supportive community of NHS staff, who are passionate and dedicated to global health work to be able to come together, network and share learning with each other and overseas partners.

b. Influence NHS policies and practice to make it easier for NHS staff to be able to participate in global health work. This includes evidencing the value of global citizenship participation to Health Boards and wider NHS.

c. Promote good practice in global health work – supporting good quality, effective and ethical global health work, recognising that NHS staff take their NHS reputation with them when they volunteer overseas.

Over recent years there have been significant shifts in the international development landscape, including a review of the Scottish Government’s approach to international development. Recognising the above, the NHS Scotland Global Citizenship Advisory Board identified that the time was right to take stock and ensure the Programme remained fit for purpose.

To do this, the NHS Scotland Global Citizenship Advisory Board and the NHS staff that the Programme supports (the ‘Community’) have worked through a number of important and sensitive issues to consider how they apply to the Programme, its ambitions and the health partnership work it supports. Issues have included the power imbalances that exist in international development work, the impact of colonisation on health inequalities and how and where international travel sits in a climate emergency.

This has resulted in the development of a Framework for Global Citizenship in the NHS (the ‘Framework’) which sets out the values and principles that underpin the NHS Scotland Global Citizenship Programme, aligns with wider policy priorities across Health and International Development and reflects updates to accepted good practice in global health.

The Framework comprises 10 key principles with associated priorities for action.

The EQIA for the Programme was updated as part of this work to assess whether participating in the Community and the support provided by the Programme differentially impacts people with protected characteristics in order that action can be taken where required.