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LaTrobe University commits to more places at proposed $24 million clinical health school
Federal Member for Nicholls Damian Drum has said he will “scramble around” to find federal funding for a $26 million nursing school in Shepparton which Goulburn Valley Health hopes will increase retention.
LaTrobe University has committed to expanding places in courses in Shepparton should the facility, which has been proposed by GV Health, be built.
The proposed facility would sit on the car park on the corner of Graham and Monash Sts, Shepparton, land GV Health already owns.
GV Health chief executive Matt Sharp said the past three to five years had left GV Health facing “increasing workforce pressures” partly due to inability to attract people to rural positions.
Regionally-trained medical professionals are more likely to stay in the regions.
“As of the last few weeks, GV Health has had vacancies in the order of 135 staff in our nursing and midwifery workforce. We also had vacancies of 40 allied health professionals,” Mr Sharp said.
“When we project forward to 2025 in terms of the redevelopment, we know that the gap in terms of our workforce retaining our workforce shortages is going to increase to approximately 350 to 360, nurses and midwives and around about another 45 allied health professionals.”
He said planning for a clinical health school for nursing and midwifery had been under way since before the pandemic and would decrease GV Health’s reliance on overseas-trained medical staff.
Deputy vice chancellor of global and regional at LaTrobe University Richard Speed said the facility would allow the university to increase the undergraduate intake of nurses and midwives by 30 and double postgraduate numbers.
“One of the things we know is that this model of training students locally, in conjunction with the local health provider, leads to students building their careers in the region,” he said.
“We have nearly 90 per cent regional employment for nurses who graduate now.”
Mr Drum said there was a “big task ahead of us” in securing the funding, which he said was a Victorian Government responsibility and not a federal one.
He said there had been dialogue with the Victorian Government but didn’t elaborate on how much discussion has gone into requesting funding for the project.
“This would normally be a state government investment but we’re now trying to find buckets of money which exists in the Federal Government to allocate to this particular project,” he said.
“We’ve gone “righto, this isn’t happening, can we come over top and find this funding.
“This isn’t about attacking the state government at all ... we’re simply saying this is a critical project.”
There was no money allocated to the project in the recent federal budget.
“We’re scrambling to try and find that money, it’s a big lump of money and not something you can find under the couch,” Mr Drum said.