@sabrowes
@RCN.org.uk North West Regional Director MSc, RN, SCPHN Cert. Public Mental Health (RCPsych) 🧪 FRSPH 👥 PCE Psychotherapy @spti-nottm.bsky.social Stumbling into middle age, occasionally fall over. Views are personal, not representative. 🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️ (He/Him)
On International Women’s Day, I’m proud to be part of that tradition.
Organising.
Leading.
Challenging.
Changing things.
That is nursing.
And that is the legacy of women who built it.
Nursing has always been collective.
Nursing has always been political.
Nursing has always involved women demanding a voice.
Today the RCN is the world’s largest nursing professional body and union.
Modern nursing grew from women challenging social expectations.
Nursing has been shaped by women stepping into public life, influencing policy, and building professional structures where none existed before.
That history matters.
Early nurse leaders were organisers, reformers, negotiators and campaigners.
They pushed for state registration of nurses.
They pushed for fair pay.
They pushed for respect for nursing as a skilled profession.
That was radical.
They wanted professional recognition.
They wanted proper education.
They wanted regulation of nursing standards.
They wanted a collective voice.
And they were prepared to challenge the system to get it.
The @rcn.org.uk, founded in 1916, began with just 34 members.
At the time, women could not vote on equal terms, had limited access to higher education, and were largely excluded from public and political life.
Yet these nurses organised anyway.
On International Women’s Day, I’ve been reflecting on the fact that nursing and the organisations that represent it were built by women who refused to accept the limits placed on them.
The history of nursing is not passive.
It is organised, political, and often radical.
#NurseSky #IWD
This is so, so wrong. Labour continually going for the evil small minded nasty vote. Refugees deserve actual refuge once their case has been judged real.
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
52,000+ patients waited longer than 24 hours to be admitted to hospitals across north-west England.
Many wait for up to 3 days. Govt doesn't publish full data
Tory austerity, NHS neglect, refusal to tax the rich inflicts misery.
And it continues. The NHS needs more capacity, not privatisation.
🤢 🤮 that is all.
www.register.service.csd.fcdo.gov.uk/united-arab-...
Headline from the FT in 2023: Victorian sewers not to blame for England's pollution, research shows Less than 12 per cent of the sewage network in England and Wales was built in the 19th century,
Well, #DirtyBusiness is an eye-opener even for those of us that have followed the sewage dumping scandal with interest. This was the biggest lie I didn’t know was a lie: “We’ve inherited a crumbling Victorian system and it’s too expensive to repair”.
No joke: I got angry hate mail today for writing an obituary of a Black woman scientist—because the person felt she did didn’t deserve the recognition.
Which just makes me want to share it again: www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Mental health nursing sits at the intersection of care, law, ethics and risk.
Done well, it protects rights, promotes recovery and safeguards communities.
Today is a moment to recognise that clearly and without cliché.
#MentalHealthNursing #EvidenceBasedPractice #SafetyCriticalCare
If we are serious about mental health care in 2026, we must be serious about:
• safe staffing and skill mix
• robust clinical supervision
• continuing professional development
• leadership that understands relational practice
• systems that support thoughtful, person-centred decision-making
Mental health nurses are not heroes.
They are highly skilled professionals operating in complex and sometimes high-stakes environments.
We should talk about the work in those terms.
Mental Health Nurses’ Day was established by the Royal College of Nursing through the RCN Mental Health Forum.
It is not simply about recognition.
It is about acknowledging complexity and accountability.
www.rcn.org.uk/Get-Involved...
This balancing act is supervised, refined and grounded in research and professional standards.
It draws on psychological theory, neuroscience, trauma-informed approaches and structured risk management.
It is neither soft nor simplistic.
Nurses often work within systems that can feel restrictive, procedural, authoritative or reactive.
Yet within those constraints, they create space for humanity, relational depth and thoughtful care.
That is professional skill, not sentiment.
Every day, mental health nurses navigate:
• empathy and professional boundaries
• hope and realism
• autonomy and restriction
• therapeutic alliance and safety
• anticipation of risk and proportional response
This balance is deliberate and learned.
Mental health nursing is safety-critical practice.
It is evidence-based. It requires:
• complex assessment
• formulation
• risk analysis
• legal literacy
• pharmacological knowledge
• therapeutic skill
This is clinical judgement exercised where decisions can have profound consequences.
🧵 Mental Health Nurses’ Day 2026.
Mental health nursing is often described in emotive language: compassion, resilience, care.
Those things matter.
But what often gets missed is the sophistication of the work.
#MentalHealthNursesDay
#NurseSky #TherapistSky
For me, the Royal Charter is not nostalgia.
It is a living constitutional framework.
It affirms that nursing has its own authority and its own responsibility to the public.
The Charter also formalises something distinctive about the RCN:
Professional authority and workforce advocacy sit side by side.
That is not a contradiction.
You cannot deliver safe care in unsafe systems.
Inclusion and excellence are not competing values.
They must be held together.
A profession that has grown by widening participation while strengthening accountability.
What strikes me most is how the Charter tells a story of expansion and inclusion.
Membership widened to include:
• Male nurses
• Students
• Enrolled nurses
• Healthcare assistants
Each amendment reflects a profession evolving without abandoning standards.
In 2026, we are leading through workforce pressure, industrial tension, system reform and public scrutiny.
Leadership cannot rest on personality or platform.
It must be grounded in legitimacy, standards and public purpose.
The Charter provides that anchor.
The Charter is the constitutional foundation of the RCN.
It formally recognises nursing as equal among the royal health colleges.
It defines our purpose, governance and authority.
It establishes us as both a professional body and a special register trade union.
That dual identity really matters.
#NurseSky
This morning I stood in front of the Royal Charter of @rcn.org.uk
Granted in 1928. “Royal” added in 1939. Amended across decades as nursing has evolved.
It would be easy to see it as ceremonial. It isn’t. 🧵
www.rcn.org.uk/news-and-eve...
#NuseSky
“Alongside this work, we will continue to support every member working in the NHS and HSC across the UK with guidance to access job evaluation as new nursing role profiles are implemented across all roles.”