Press Conference - University of Tasmania, Rozelle Campus

JASON CLARE, MINISTER FOR EDUCATION: On safety in our childcare centres. From tomorrow, the next stage of child safety training rolls out. The first stage of training started in February and the workforce has done that training and tomorrow the next stage of training rolls out. And this is important because there is no greater asset that we've got in our childcare system than our workers to keep our kids safe. And 99.9 per cent of our workers love our kids, care for our kids, want to keep our kids safe, but they want the training and support so that they can identify somebody who might be up to no good. The first stage of that training is now done and the next stage rolls out from tomorrow. Second, I'm here at the University of Tasmania's campus in Sydney to talk about paid prac. This time last week the Prime Minister announced the extension of paid prac. This is a great Labor achievement. A lot of students at university have a practical part of their university degree where they're not here on campus, They're out on the road, if you're an ambulance officer. They're in a classroom, if you're a school teacher. They're in a hospital if you're training to be a nurse. And that practical training can make life really tough. If you're struggling to make ends meet, paying the bills. Because sometimes you've got to give up your part-time job to do it, sometimes you've got to move hundreds of kilometres away to do it. And if you're already renting here in Sydney and you've got to move away to do your prac, you might end up having to rent somewhere else as well. So, you're paying rent in two places at once. 

As I learned today, sometimes it means students are sleeping in their own cars to do it. This is why people talk about placement poverty, that doing prac is very, very hard. And so financial help to get you through your placement is really important. It can help to pay for petrol, pay for parking at the hospital, it can help to pay the bills, to pay the rent. And at the moment, paid prac's available for teaching students, for nursing students, for midwifery students and for social work students. What the Prime Minister announced last week is we're now extending that to 10 more frontline health professions. That includes psychology, includes occupational therapy, speech pathology, pharmacy and it also includes paramedics, the sort of people that you see behind me right now. I want to use this opportunity to thank the Health Services Union, who've been great advocates for this work for paid prac because they know the difference that it will make. I want to thank Belinda and the team at the University of Tasmania here in Sydney for the work they do in training the next generation of paramedics. I'll ask Belinda to say a few words, then I might ask Lauren from the HSU to say a few words. And then we've got Lexx and Taylor who are two students here at the university training to become paramedics and hear what they've got to say about what paid prac will mean for them. Over to you, Belinda.

BELINDA FLANAGAN: Thank you. This is an absolutely wonderful opportunity for our paramedic students. Paramedic students across Australia really do suffer financial hardship and this is absolutely amazing. We really try and monitor our students working part-time jobs and full-time placement plus their study. This financial assistance is just going to be a massive benefit.

LAUREN HUTCHINS: This is a huge announcement. It means that those critical health professions where there are workforce shortages right now, we can attract and retain students into the future. So, it means that people don't have to finish a prac and then go to work and then start a prac the next day. Tired students are a worry for existing workers, but also to themselves. It just means such a relief to people who are making decisions about their future. So, we're very excited about this. We're really excited for our paramedic students here about what this will mean for them into the future.

We know that there are real workforce shortages across the country and this will go a huge way to addressing those. It'll also mean that students that are doing prac don't have to then finish that prac to go to a job to then start prac the next day, which isn't safe for them. It's not safe for the staff that they're working or, you know, the workers that they're with. And it can, you know, lead to issues for patients that need care. So, we're really excited about this. We're really excited for the students who will benefit from this. We look forward to it rolling out across the country.

LEXX: My name's Lexx and I'm a Bachelor of Paramedicine student at the University of Tasmania. And this actually does make a big difference to me. I am a sole provider for myself, so I have my own business and I also live alone. So, going on prac, which is actually three times for a month, means that I have two rents to pay. So, one at home and one for my business. And I cannot earn any income at the time because when we're doing our practice, we still also have our other units of study to do as well. So, being able to have like a few hundred dollars extra a week to help out really, for me personally, makes a big difference because I don't have the other people to fall back on. And also, you know, so one of our pracs will be during school holidays. So, having to go pay for accommodation elsewhere at a peak rate is actually a lot. So, I was so excited to hear that the paramedicine students were included in this because. Because, yeah, for myself, that sort of a buffer just takes a bit of the pressure off and means that I might not have to try to squeeze in some work in between, you know, some stressful shifts where we're learning so much and trying to take it all in. So, I'm very appreciative.

TAYLOR: I'm Taylor. I'm also studying a bachelor here at UTAS and I want to echo what Lexx said. It is a big stress for all of us. Everybody talks about how we will be living out of home, we'll be paying for two accommodations as well as working full time and study doesn't stop when we are on placement. We still need to do all those hours. And so it was a big stress and it was really, really awesome to hear that. We are also going to get that extension of this payment because we were warned, like, this is the reality that we have to face. We may end up staying in our cars to make sure that we can do this because this is the degree that we chose and it's full on and so, it's going to relieve a lot of that pressure, which we're really, really grateful for.