1st Report - A sustainable veterinary workforce

Key findings

• The UK veterinary profession does not lack overall numbers but struggles with distribution: public sector roles, rural practices and geographically isolated areas face persistent recruitment and retention crises, with attrition rates in some deficit areas described as 'appalling' at around two years tenure.
• Veterinary education is financially unsustainable: training costs £25,000 per year while government funding provides only £19,500 per home student; reliance on international student fee cross-subsidisation creates strategic risks and masks true cost pressures.
• The profession is increasingly dependent on overseas recruitment (96% of official veterinarian roles at the Food Standards Agency are filled by international vets), but Skilled Worker Visa salary thresholds of £49,500 (£34,600 for new entrants) create barriers as UK early-career salaries are misaligned with visa costs.
• Competition and Markets Authority remedies for small animal services are broadly welcomed but risk unintended consequences: price transparency proposals may disadvantage independents; prescription fee caps could undermine rural mixed practices that rely on small animal service revenues to subsidise farm animal services.
• The Veterinary Surgeons Act 1966 requires comprehensive reform to modernise regulation, expand clinical roles for veterinary nurses and technicians, and provide flexibility as the profession evolves; coordinated alignment between CMA interim measures and longer-term legislative reform is essential.

Recommendations

• Defra should, within six months, commission a sector-wide review working with RCVS, veterinary schools, BVA and major employers to establish robust evidence on drivers of retention; the review should identify attrition patterns by sector and geography, pinpoint retention factors particularly in public and rural roles, propose targeted interventions with clear metrics and baseline data, and set measurable annual improvement targets.
• The Home Office, in collaboration with Defra, should review Skilled Worker Visa salary thresholds for veterinary roles by early 2027 to reflect realistic early-career salary progression, avoid barriers to overseas recruitment into shortage roles, and align with public health and food safety workforce needs; findings should be published after RCVS, BVA and major employer consultation.
• The government should, within the next Spending Review, undertake a full review of veterinary education funding jointly by Defra and Department for Education to assess the cost-funding gap for domestic students, set out options to close it including increased teaching grants, and ensure long-term financial sustainability of veterinary schools recognising their strategic importance.
• Defra and the RCVS should, within 18 months, work with veterinary schools to develop and implement sector-wide guidance on contextual and flexible admissions, supporting contextual offers and alternative access routes, encouraging rural recruitment, and publishing annual monitoring results by background and geography.
• Government should ensure the CMA's remedies are fully rural-proofed by instructing the CMA, with RCVS partnership, to establish a monitoring framework by September 2027 covering prices, competition, business sustainability and service access in rural areas; CMA should publish a formal impact review by March 2029 assessing effects on mixed practices and rural provision, with corrective measures within six months if adverse effects are identified.
• In bringing forward Veterinary Surgeons Act reforms, the government should ensure it sets out how accreditation requirements can be made more flexible and adaptable, allowing greater curriculum freedom while maintaining high standards.
• Defra should provide clear explanation of how CMA interim remedies will interact with longer-term Veterinary Surgeons Act reform to ensure alignment, avoid duplication, and minimise unintended consequences.

Key actors

Alistair Carmichael, Dr Rob Williams (British Veterinary Association), Dr Christine Middlemiss (Chief Veterinary Officer), Professor Tim Parkin (Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons), Professor Caroline Argo (Scotland's Rural College), Katie Pettifer (Food Standards Agency), Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Minister for Biosecurity, Borders and Animals), Competition and Markets Authority