Source: New Zealand Nurses Organisation
A policy to pay nursing students a weekly allowance while they’re on clinical placements will help them graduate and boost Aotearoa New Zealand’s homegrown nursing workforce, NZNO says.
Tōpūtanga Tapuhi Kaitiaki o Aotearoa NZNO President Anne Daniels says a Green Party policy announced today would be good news for nursing ākonga (students).
“About 30% of all nursing students drop out before finishing their course and this rises to more than 35% for Māori ākonga. A big driver of this is the required 1000 hours of clinical placement which is often away from their hometown and shift work hours.
“This makes it almost impossible for ākonga to do their usual part-time jobs that support them during their studies. It is even harder for ākonga with children and dependents such as elderly parents and grandparents.
“New Zealand desperately needs a sustainable homegrown nursing workforce. NZNO calls on all political parties to adopt the Greens’ policy as one measure that will help address the crisis in our health sector and ensure we can care for an aging and increasingly sicker population,” Anne Daniels says.
NZNO National Student Unit co-leader Josh Lang says the additional support of a $1500 relocation payment would be a huge help to ākonga.
“In recent years ākonga have been forced to sleep in cars and tents on their placements because they can’t afford or find alternative accommodation. It’s unsurprising that so many drop out of training for their dream career.
“Having a universal placement allowance means ākonga from all backgrounds and postcodes will have the same opportunity to become nurses. This would be a gamechanger for many of our classmates who are mature students or parents with limited resources,” Josh Lang says.