MEDIA DOORSTOP
WHERE: 54 Tamar Street Launceston
WHEN: 1:30pm, Monday, 24 August 2026

The Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation Tasmanian Branch continues to provide support and advice to members across the State who are flabbergasted by the business as usual approach that the Tasmanian Government is taking to the Tasmanian Health System.

“While the Government boasts about the net additional nurses and midwives that they have recruited and that it is a net increase compared to those who have left, what it doesn’t address is the insufficient staffing levels on many wards and units every shift right across the State,” ANMF Tasmanian Branch Secretary Emily Shepherd said.

“The ANMF heard from members at the Royal Hobart Hospital just last week about instances where they were coming onto shift with 6-8 staff short of their safe staffing minimum and while some of these shifts are filled with double shifts, not all of them were with many working short staffed.

“While the ANMF welcomes Government’s new policy position that the ANMF has been advocating for years – employing permanent staff instead of agency staff to safely staff our health system – the job is far from finished with some establishments almost 40 staff short of their minimums to fill their rosters safely.

”Ms Shepherd said in addition to the staffing challenges, many members are grappling with the additional workloads that short staffing brings with many exhausted and burnt out which is exacerbating sick leave and members are also falling ill.

“Coupled with increasing demand in EDs the State’s EDs last week almost all at critical capacity and the LGH ED experiencing a full department over the weekend.

“Members are rightly asking, when on earth will action be taken to support the health system and the staff working in it to deliver safe and quality health care.

“When members are seeing patients on trolleys parked in makeshift wards in ambulance off load bays as occurred at the LGH over the weekend, many members are feeling incredibly disillusioned.”

“Members are tired of superficial throwaway lines about record spending, commitments to infrastructure that will take 10 years or more to come about which will then not even meet demand and that celebrations about some extra staff when it’s a drop in the ocean of what is actually needed – members want real and genuine action with a commitment to provide the resources and support needed to address these chronic and systemic issues.”

The ANMF will continue to support members in the Tasmanian Industrial Commission on the many ongoing disputes in regard to safe staffing.

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Media contact:
Emily Shepherd, ANMF Tasmanian Branch Secretary
Mobile: 0400 884 021
Email: Emily.Shepherd@anmftas.org.au