LABOR RAISES THE BAR FOR GOVERNMENT ON NURSE EDUCATION
July 14 2003
Labor’s announcement that it will create thousands of additional undergraduate and postgraduate university places for nursing students raises the bar for the Government in terms of tackling the nursing shortage facing Australia,” the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) said on Monday.
“While both the major parties agree on the urgent need to reverse the shortage of working nurses, today’s announcement signals that Labor would be prepared to direct greater Commonwealth investment towards fixing the problem,” said Dr Carolyn Allport, NTEU President.
“Labor’s announcement that it would create 3,125 new full time and part time undergraduate nursing places and allocate an additional $43.4 million towards their clinical training component, raises the bar for the Government in terms of measures to stem the decline of new entrants into the nursing profession.”
“The NTEU also supports Labor’s pledge to allocate funding to create 500 full-time postgraduate nursing HECS places.”
“This measure, on top of their previous commitment to oppose any move to charge full fees to postgraduate coursework students, will go directly to the issue of making nursing a more attractive profession, particularly in specialist areas,” said Dr Allport.
“All specialist nurse training courses, such as aged care, mental health, midwifery and palliative care, are postgraduate coursework courses and most of these areas suffer from labour market shortages.”
“Education Minister Dr Brendan Nelson’s proposal to add to the debt accrued by undergraduate nursing students by charging full fees for postgraduate coursework studies, will act as a disincentive for those who wish to gain specialist knowledge and would undermine the positive measures contained in the Government’s education reform package.”
For information and comment
Dr Carolyn Allport, NTEU President
03 9254 1910 or 0419 349 064
Andrew Nette, NTEU Policy and Research Coordinator:
03 9254 1910 04 or 0438 026 277