Te Kaunihera o Ngā Kareti Rata o Aotearoa |The Council
of Medical Colleges in New Zealand (CMC) welcomes the Health
Workforce Plan released today.
“The Health sector
has been crying out for a workforce plan for too long – it
is so good to see a clear plan with short and long term
initiatives to retain, grow and recruit our health
workers,” said CMC Chair, Dr Samantha Murton.
The
Council of Medical Colleges has long been calling for a
robust, well-trained, culturally safe health workforce that
meets the needs of patients and whānau in Aotearoa New
Zealand.
“We are glad to see that the Health
Workforce Plan reflects some of the ongoing discussions we
have had with Ministers and Officials – particularly about
how to increase the capacity of prevocational training and
vocational training programmes to bolster our home-grown
workforce.
“We welcome the efforts to increase the
number of home-grown health practitioners, look after and
retain our hard-working health workforce, and supplement our
homegrown workforce with international recruits.
“We
support the intention to over-represent Māori and Pacifica
trainees in our workforce, to balance the effects of
international medical graduates and to make sure we have a
health system as diverse as the communities we
serve.
With an aging population and growing demand for
healthcare services, the CMC considers it essential that we
have a sustainable workforce to meet the health needs of our
communities now and into the future.
“Medicine is a
challenging but highly rewarding career; we strongly
encourage aspiring medical students to take advantage of the
opportunity this plan presents and the 50 additional funded
student places announced recently.
“Training more
medical specialists will always take more time than the next
365 days as this plan outlines, so we look forward to
working with Te Whatu Ora and Te Aka Whai Ora to help
alleviate the workforce shortage,” Dr Murton
said.
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