Member for Gosford Liesl Tesch has reaffirmed the NSW Government’s commitment to improving working conditions for healthcare staff and the overall public health system.
She said data recently revealed that the former Liberal National Government had left 1,112 nurses employed under a temporary contract, unfunded beyond the 2024-25 financial year.
“Rather than looking after the essential workers who power our state, the former government sought to undermine them,” Tesch said.
“As our nurses cried out for more government support, the Liberal National Government cut 57 nurses on the Central Coast from the budget, with those positions unfunded from June 20, 2024.
“Our nurses deserve so much better than this.”
Tesch said the new Labor Government was committed to improving the lives of frontline workers, ensuring that NSW did not lose the healthcare workers who were thinking of leaving the state for better working conditions.
“We are investing in our health workers, rolling out safe staffing levels in our hospitals, boosting paramedic numbers, and scrapping the public sector wages cap,” she said.
“We are focused on recruiting and retaining more skilled health workers. We are determined to get on with the job and improve the operation of our public health system.”
Tesch said in State Parliament Question Time on June 21, Minister for Health Ryan Park said that “in a time when the Shadow Health Minister was saying that he was recruiting 10,000-plus nursing workforce, he should have included an asterisk outlining that 1,100 of those were only temporary”.
Tesch outlined the Labor Government’s plan to repair and renew the health system including: $175M to recruit 1,200 nurses and midwives within the first four years of a Minns Government; reforming the current nurse rostering system and replacing it with an enforceable minimum shift-by-shift staffing model; removing the public sector wage cap which limits pay increases for nurses, paramedics and health workers; and $150M to fund an additional 500 paramedics over four years.
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Member for Gosford Liesl Tesch