Queensland election: Nurses union says staff targets are at risk without pay rises

Queensland’s ‘tired and overworked’ nurses must be paid above the government’s budgeted wage policy or neither side of politics will be able to recruit promised health staff, a union warns.

Emergency doctor Eric Richman, Labor’s candidate for the Brisbane LNP seat of Moggill, and Premier Steven Miles at Kenmore Ambulance Station on Wednesday. Picture: Adam Head

Queensland’s “tired and overworked” nurses must be paid above the government’s budgeted wage policy or neither side of politics will be able to recruit the health staff they’ve promised, the state’s nurses’ union says.

On the hustings alongside Labor’s emergency doctor candidate for the Brisbane LNP seat of Moggill, Eric Richman, Premier Steven Miles said Labor would deliver 15,875 more frontline health workers in the next four years, including 8555 more nurses.

The promised recruitment boost would cost $340m and would be funded by borrowing more, increasing the state’s ballooning debt.

At the same event, Queensland Nurses and Midwives Union state secretary Sarah Beaman said it was “absolutely critically important” that nurses received wage increases of above the government’s 2.5 per cent per annum salary policy, or risk nurses leaving to work interstate.

“If we need to recruit these numbers … we need nation-leading wages and conditions. Without nation-leading wages and conditions, we will lose staff to other states. So (a new enterprise bargaining agreement) is going to be a critical component of recruiting the nurses to these areas, and also initiatives to retain the nurses and midwives that we have,” she said.

Ms Beaman said a recent survey confirmed 50 per cent of nurses were threatening to leave the profession because they were overworked and tired.

The Australian revealed recently that three-year EBAs for public servant nurses, doctors, teachers and police are all due to expire next year, forcing whichever party wins government to the negotiating table.

Taxpayers will be slugged an extra $352m a year for every percentage point salary rise above the 2.5 per cent budgeted.

Ms Beaman said the nurses’ union – which has advised its members to preference the LNP last – would fight “really, really hard” to make sure government wages policy was at a level that allowed workers to have a real pay rise, above the level of inflation.

She said public servants would also push to retain the Australian-first Cost of Living Adjustment negotiated in the last round of enterprise bargaining.

Asked whether public servants would be better paid under Labor or the LNP, Mr Miles said: “I think everyone knows they’ll be better paid under Labor.”

“We have a long and proud history of bargaining in good faith with our employees and their union representatives and delivering them good, strong EBAs; we have the best paid nurses in the country. That’s something I’m proud of,” he added.

Mr Miles left the door open to giving public servants wage rises above the budgeted 2.5 per cent. “We’ll have to see the circumstances when we set that wages policy,” he said.

“As you know, inflation is now abating. The most recent inflation figure was 2.7 per cent; the ABS credited our cost-of-living measures with driving down that inflation rate, but obviously we’ll always take that into account, just as we did last time with those pay rises and the cost-of-living allowances.”

The Australian revealed this week that the public service wage bill had ballooned by more than 75 per cent in the decade since Annastacia Palaszczuk was elected in 2015.

Campaigning in Townsville, Opposition Leader David Crisafulli would not say whether an LNP government would pay public servants more than Labor, giving an assurance only that they would have a “good wage” and be well-resourced.

“When I speak to those frontline staff, they want to be well-paid; they also want to be able to go to work and do their job, and there is a reason the attrition rate has fallen off a cliff when it comes to police and teachers and nurses and it is because they don’t feel respected and valued in their job.

“You only have to look at how competitive an environment it is to know that wages are important, so too is the system, and right now they are leaving in droves because the system is broken.”

Mr Crisafulli, who has vowed to employ 18,700 more nurses and midwives by 2032, would not commit to going above the budgeted 2.5 per cent wage increase. “I want an environment where unions are able to have a seat at the table and they’re treated with respect, and I commit to giving that opportunity and we will negotiate in good faith.”