WeRPN has been actively advocating to the government to take key actions in support the recruitment and retention of nurses across our health system.
Today, the government released its 2024 budget, outlining key provincial investments for the coming year. WeRPN was pleased to see movement on key priorities for RPNs. In particular, we welcome ongoing investments in home and community care and a commitment to enhance wages for nurses in that sector. We also applaud major investments in primary care that will enhance access to care for thousands of Ontarians and help alleviate pressures on our hospitals. RPN play an important role in the delivery of primary care and we are pleased to see investments to grow these inter-professional teams. We are also pleased to see the creation of 1000 new seats in practical nursing programs across the province to help grow the nursing profession. While WeRPN appreciates the government’s ongoing efforts to recruit more nurses, we continue to call for further urgent action to support the retention of experienced nurses across the health system.
Ontario continues to experience a decline in the number of RPNs registered to practice at a time when we need more of these nurses to meet the needs of our aging population. To address this challenge, WeRPN continues to call on government to implement key retention strategies such as legislating nurse to patient ratios, regulating for profit nursing agencies as well as enhancing and harmonizing wages across sectors. We look forward to working with government to advance these key priorities. Without further action in these areas, we risk losing more experienced nurses and valuable expertise from the health system.