State of the service: Public sector jobs on the rise, but NT Health hits three year low
NT health workforce numbers have fallen to their lowest levels in three years. See how the department’s staffing rates are stacking up.
News
Don't miss out on the headlines from News. Followed categories will be added to My News.
NT Health continues to haemorrhage staff with the hospitals and clinics losing more than 800 workers in two years.
Last week the Office of the Commissioner for Public Employment released the September and December quarterly data on staffing numbers across 12 NT government departments.
It showed NT Health had recorded a negative staffing numbers for the eighth quarter in a row, falling from 8122 full time employees in December 2021, to 7296 in December 2023.
In just 12 months the service has lost 207 full time equivalent roles.
With 7296 full time equivalent health roles filled, this is the Territory’s smallest health workforce in three years.
Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation NT branch secretary Cath Hatcher said frontline workers were “doing it tough”, with vacancy rates ranging from 4 to 80 per cent across the Territory’s hospitals, health centres and remote clinics.
Ms Hatcher said pandemic “burnout” meant one in five Australian nurses had left the profession nationally – but even before the crisis the Territory was recording a 3 to 8 per cent staffing shortfall.
While she said staffing rates had improved since December, the impacts on Alice Springs and Royal Darwin hospitals was acute in the early months of 2024.
Ms Hatcher said the department “struggled” to fill specialty roles in the emergency department, intensive care unit and renal centres.
“They are doing the hardest to make sure that every patient is accurately looked after and getting all their needs, and they’re exhausted and they’re tired,” she said.
Health Minister Selena Uibo said a $2.2bn budget investment into the health system would provide a “sustainable health workforce”.
Ms Uibo said the drop in health workers was just a return to “pre-Covid levels of staffing”, following a employment peak for pandemic responses and quarantine services.
“The decline reflects the closure of those services,“ she said.
She said a key part of improving staff retention was growing the local health workforce, with a $24m federal government investment into a new Charles Darwin University medical school and more nurses and midwives graduating in the NT.
It comes amid an overall rise in the number of public servant roles over the past 12 months, following a three-year record low in December 2022.
According to the OCPE there was a total of 22,310 public servant roles in the December quarter, 209 more than the same time last year.
The public service is the Territory’s largest employer, with around 10 per cent of Territorians on the government’s payroll.
United Workers Union NT Secretary Erina Early said a strong public sector meant the delivery of critical services to Territorians, calling for an expansion of government jobs particularly in the regions.
“Government should always be the leading employer for job creation, job security and jobs for young people,” Ms Early said.
“If public sector employment figures are declining, we have a problem.”
The departments that saw the biggest 12-month staffing boosts were the Attorney-General’s department with 103 new employees, 63 workers for Environment, Parks and Water Security and 55 for Police, Fire and Emergency Services.
The December data said there were 15 additional education workers compared to the previous year, despite Department acknowledging it had 143 vacancies at the start of the school year.
Australian Education Union NT president Michelle Ayres said while education department staffing figures were “fairly steady”, it was not reflecting the reality in classrooms.
Ms Ayres said there was remained a teacher shortage across urban and remote schools, but the ‘bureaucratic bloat’ disguised this in OCPE data.
According to the latest Productivity Commission data, the Territory has the highest rate of education bureaucrats, with 12 per cent of the 2022 workforce not active in schools.
This is three times the national average.
“It is necessary to centralise some services when we’re working in such a remote context,” Ms Ayes said.
“But at the same time, the teachers, the frontline staff, the boots on the ground … if we don’t get that right, what’s the point of the rest of it?”
The Territory budget is expected to commit an additional $100m to education, to a total of $1.34bn.
More Coverage
Originally published as State of the service: Public sector jobs on the rise, but NT Health hits three year low
Man arrested after taxi driver punched in back of head
A man has been arrested after he allegedly punched a taxi driver in the back of the head | Assault suspected after injured man with internal bleeding seeks medical help. Read more Top End crime news.
Joy ride: Car stolen in brazen act while carers, residents inside home
A stolen car has been found abandoned after it was stolen from a disability care facility and taken for a joy ride which left it with extensive damage. Latest Red Centre crime news.