A nursing roster with multiple vacancies across multiple shifts is a sign of the staffing crisis facing our health service, say local members of the NSW Nurses and Midwives Association.
The Association is calling for a 15 per cent pay rise for the sector and Forbes members rallied outside the hospital last Thursday to add their voices to the campaign.
Their Forbes District Hospital branch president Sophie Milton says a pay increase will improve recruitment and retention.
“(It’s) Something that has really come to light here at Forbes just this week with a roster being published with multiple shift vacancies for multiple days before any unplanned leave or sick leave is taken,” she said at the rally. “So we cannot fill a roster on the staff that we have therefore overtime is expected.”
Their call comes after NSW hospitals saw record emergency department presentations in the January-March quarter according to Bureau of Health Information statistics.
One nurse at the rally told The Advocate she’d worked 35 hours overtime last fortnight.
It’s not just an issue for Forbes: the NSW NMA says that State-wide, nurses and midwives worked 2.8 million hours of overtime in 2022/ 2023.
The Association says nurses and midwives are burnt out and exhausted as they work short-staffed and do extra hours.
The Association is also calling for improvements to night duty penalty, sick leave entitlements, continuing education allowance and salary packaging improvements.
“NSW nurses and midwives are now the lowest paid nurses in Australia – this is a greater cost to NSW and our communities as we’re losing nurses and midwives to other states so maintaining safe staffing is near impossible without excessive overtime to cover shifts,” Ms Milton said.
“Overtime is unfortunately welcomed by the staff because of our 2008 equivalent wages in a 2024 cost of living crisis, it’s how many are making ends meet.”
At Forbes, nurses participated in an own-time rally, chanting “better pay and then we’ll stay” and holding posters saying “help us care, pay us fair!”
In response, a spokesperson for the NSW Government says they will work with workers and their unions.
“The negotiations are still in their early stages and eight negotiation meetings have been held between NSW Health and the NSW Nurses and Midwives’ Association since a log of claims was served in May 2024,” the spokesperson said.
“Since taking office, the NSW Government has invested heavily in the health workforce including major priorities identified by the union and workforce.
“Last year the NSW Government abolished the wages cap and delivered the largest pay rise for nurses and midwives in over a decade, with the majority of NSWNMA members voting to accept this 4.5 per cent wages offer.”
The government has provided $572 million to provide permanent funding for the jobs of 1,112 nurses and midwives left unfunded from June 30 this year by the previous Government; and offered 1500 scholarships to studying or graduating nurses and midwives who commit to work in NSW Health.
“The number of nurses has increased by over 2,000 FTE since taking office (to a total of over 56,000 FTE) and the retention rate has improved by one percentage point to 93.5 per cent,” the spokesperson said..
“Yes there are incentives to attract staff but if staff were not leaving in the first place and were valued this would not be needed,” Ms Milton said at the local rally.
“Our commitment has been shown through COVID and then here during the floods where staff were ferried across flood waters in fire trucks and then boats when that was no longer a safe option,” Ms Milton said.
“Being on a fire truck or boat during the night in rising flood waters was far from a joy ride but we did what was needed.”
‘Nurses call for 15pc’, Forbes Advocate (online), 31 Jul 2024 ‹https://infoweb-newsbank-com.ezproxy.sl.nsw.gov.au/apps/news/document-view?p=AWGLNB&docref=news/19AA6C6FD9538540›