Building a thriving physiotherapy community

Four out of five registered physiotherapists chose to be CSP chartered members, with 80.1 per cent of the Health and Care Professions Council’s register of physiotherapists in CSP membership.

Although Covid-19 receding made more face-to-face contact possible in workplaces and universities, pressures on members’ time and energy remained, affecting capacity to volunteer to undertake in person member recruitment. To supplement the efforts of workplace representatives, we introduced a ‘Refer and Reward’ recruitment incentive scheme. Members recruited an extra 195 members between May and December.

To support physiotherapists dealing with the threat of conflict in their countries, we introduced a new affiliate membership category to provide access to certain CSP benefits to displaced practitioners and students who were seeking asylum in the UK.

We saw a continued increase in the diversity of our membership, and a substantial rise in members feeling comfortable sharing details of their protected characteristics with us.

The proportion of our membership identifying as Black, Asian, or Minority Ethnic (BAME) grew from 10.9 per cent to 12.5 per cent; and those identifying as LGBTQIA+ grew from 1.8 per cent to 2.3 per cent. The figure for members reporting one or more disabilities remained at 4.9 per cent.

Reflecting the continued pressures on voluntary time, we recorded an unsurprising 7.3 per cent drop in members’ engagement with CSP over the year. However, there were several areas where activity grew significantly, and members came together in large numbers to support our NHS pay campaign, to fight the loss of practice space, and to protect rehab services.

Part of our engagement effort has been to build members’ confidence to influence others. Our influencers network continued to grow, and members used our influencing training and support to advocate successfully for physiotherapy in their regions and countries.  

We also aimed to build members’ sense of belonging with CSP, particularly with members from marginalised communities. Our polling showed these groups of members feeling as strong a bond with us as the membership overall.