A Victorian government plan to pay for the university degrees of more than 10,000 nurses and midwives could help ease the shortage of health workers in NSW, a University of Wollongong expert says.
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Associate Professor Caleb Ferguson, from UOW's School of Nursing, says the plan announced at the weekend by Victorian Premier Dan Andrews would be a "tipping point" and should be considered by the NSW Government.
"There's a difficulty filling vacancies and positions, so anything that better supports candidates to come into the profession is a fantastic investment from the government," he said.
"We need to think about how we can attract the brightest and most talented people into the profession."
In Victoria, the nurses and midwives will be recruited and trained for free from next year as part of a $270 million initiative announced by the Victorian government on Sunday.
Under the five-year program, all new domestic students enrolling in a professional-entry nursing and midwifery course in 2023 and 2024 will receive a scholarship of up to $16,500 to cover course costs.
Students will receive $9000 over their three years of study and the remaining $7500 would be paid off if they work in Victorian public health services for two years.
Prof Ferguson said it was a timely policy, given the "general stress and attrition, the burnout and the pressures the health system is under".
Read more: Aged care fears over Vic nurses' free uni
"This is very timely - it takes three years for someone to complete a Bachelor of Nursing or Bachelor of Midwifery, and so it's great to see they are thinking about growing their own talent in Victoria," he said.
"It's not globally responsible to just keep pulling nurses from overseas. We need to have a serious conversation about growing our own health workforce."
He said asking the nurses to work in the public health system in exchange for the final $7500 of the university fees was a "fair mechanism" which would give a government a return on its investment.
"It's a government investment in the health workforce and you want them to give back," he said.
"The public health system also provides a really good, strong foundation for a nursing career."
Prof Ferguson said it was also necessary to consider how to retain nurses and improve their working conditions more broadly, to stop high attrition rates in the profession.
The NSW Nurses and Midwives' Association (NSWNMA) has also urged NSW to follow Victoria's lead, warning that NSW was at risk of being left behind.
The union's General Secretary Shaye Candish said it was imperative the NSW government acknowledged the current staffing issues in public hospitals.
"The Victorian government's announcement is exactly the type of forward-thinking we have been championing in NSW to address some of the workforce concerns we can already see coming down the line here," said Ms Candish.
"In recent years, we've seen three thousand nurses and midwives move interstate, because they can experience better working conditions with mandated safe nurse-to-patient ratios in Victoria, Queensland, the ACT and soon to be in South Australia.
"Nurses and midwives want to show up for their shifts knowing there are enough suitably skilled other nurses and midwives to work alongside them and deliver the safest, best possible care to every patient.
"We know there are plenty of nurses and midwives pulling out of university studies or worse, walking away from a career in nursing or midwifery because they've had a negative experience during clinical placement in NSW."
Independent Kiama MP Gareth Ward has also called on the government fund free study for new nurses and midwives, writing to the Premier and Leader of the Opposition to ask for a bipartisan commitment.
"My grandmother was a nurse and my sister is a nurse," he said.
"It's a really tough profession and we need more nurses and midwives but you can't just 'add water' you need to invest in training and recruitment.
"The fact that a government of a different political persuasion in another State has developed and announced this initiative should be no barrier to implementing the same good public policy here in NSW, as quickly as possible. And this one is a race!
"We risk losing thousands of potential future NSW nurses and midwives to Victoria forever."
The Victorian Government's plan has been costed as a $270 million program to recruit and train 17,000 nurses and midwives, with 10,000 of those expected to be new students,
"Additionally, I am calling on the NSW Government to duplicate other payments to upskill existing nurses and midwives," Mr Ward said.
"This includes scholarships of up to $10,000 for postgraduate nurses to complete specialty studies, $11,000 scholarships for enrolled nurses to become registered nurses, $12,000 scholarships to support training and employment of 100 new Nurse Practitioners."
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