Nurses are set for a pay increase after Finance Minister Prof Biman Prasad announced in Parliament yesterday the salaries and wages budget for the ministry had been increased to $126.4 million.
He said from this, $11.6m would go towards the upgrade of nurses salaries and overtime.
This allocation will also cater for 250 intern nurses to move up to become registered nurses, 237 new intern nurses, 46 nursing assistants, 50 nursing aides, 40 midwives and 94 medical laboratory scientists.
“These additional positions will help improve the service gaps and address the current capacity needs within the ministry,” Prof Prasad said.
“The nursing assistant and nurse aide positions have been created to support our nurses focus on their core role.”
“These aides and assistants will take over the nonclinical responsibilities like making the bed, getting the consumables, and other time-consuming tasks that used to keep the nurses occupied.”
Health permanent secretary Dr James Fong said irregularities and anomalies were covered.
He also said as mentioned by minister, the nursing assistants and attendants would be support staff doing non-clinic duties, these were new posts and not taken from nursing posts.
