industry & reform
Time for action
ANMF South Australia CEO Elizabeth Dabars . Picture : Tricia Watkinson / NewsCorp Australia
Nursing chief calls for the staffing gap to be filled .
Elizabeth Dabars interviewed by Elise Hartevelt
Nurses and midwives have recently taken to the streets demanding more staff , and better pay and work conditions .
Organised by NSW ’ s Nurses and Midwives Association , this year ’ s third strike came in response to the state ’ s health workforce boost that ’ s planning to fork out $ 4.5 billion over four years to relieve staffing pressures .
The ANMF believes the budget to be ‘ all smoke and mirrors ’.
“ We stand in solidarity with our sister branch ,” says Elizabeth Dabars , CEO of ANMF South Australia .
Dabars estimates SA will be short of thousands of nurses and midwives by 2025 , as staff are exhausted and weighing up early retirement .
She Joined Nursing Review in an honest discussion about addressing workforce shortages and ANMFSA ’ s plans to push for health care reform .
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NR : The New South Wales branch recently held its third strike this year . What do you hope they ’ ll achieve ? ED : We do stand in solidarity with the nurses and midwives in New South Wales , because it ’ s really important that they achieve what they need to , which is appropriate quality care . They ’ re going to achieve that by getting a staff-topatient ratio .
We are a bit different here in South Australia insofar as before the last election , the now incumbent state government actually committed to staffto-patient ratios in its first term . So we are in a different environment here , but we certainly are in full support of them and their decision to take action because they need to do what ’ s best for their patients and each other .
How would you currently describe the situation for nurses in South Australia ? It ’ s extremely difficult , to be perfectly frank . I have been out and about talking directly with nurses and midwives , and the message is that they ’ re fatigued , stressed and stretched . I have heard from people who are contemplating early retirement , people who are looking to reduce their hours because the work pressures are just so high .
I think it ’ s a really dangerous period for us because we don ’ t currently have those ratios , and we have had and will continue to have a very large problem with workforce availability . Even in circumstances where the employer is being very helpful and wanting to put on additional nurses , there ’ s simply not enough staff .
We raised this issue of workforce with the previous government and with the new government . We have very warmly welcomed their commitment to putting more than 300 additional beds in the system . That ’ s fantastic : the only issue is that they ’ re struggling already to staff the beds that they ’ ve already got .
We know that there ’ s an impending workforce shortage . It ’ s actually nationwide , but in South Australia , the figures will be approximately 10 to 15,000 nurses and midwives short by the year 2025 .
Those estimations were made well before COVID and that ’ s the last data we ’ ve got , which goes to show the problem . There hasn ’ t been any workforce analysis and planning for a significant