Health attracts foreign staff with "generous" £8k relocation package

Thursday 15 June 2017

Overseas health professionals are being offered up to £8,000 to relocate to Jersey in a bid to bring their “specialist” skills to the Island.

‘Care Rediscovered’ – a six-month social media-driven recruitment campaign – was set up to help plug the skills gap of nursing and health professionals in Jersey, where there are few options to gain expert-level qualifications.

In a bid to woo professionals from further afield, the website boasts that, “…Jersey is the place to let [care skills] shine.”

“Jersey is an island community built on care and it’s why we look out for, and after, one another so well. This is your chance to make the move, start a new adventure and rediscover why you love what you do, and who you are. This is care rediscovered,” the home page reads.

25 vacancies are currently advertised on the site, with salaries ranging from around £38,000 to over £50,000. In the UK, experienced nurse salaries are around £34,000. Of these positions, nine relate to mental health-related nursing, while 11 are for acute conditions.

Nursing opportunities in Jersey https://t.co/kEGayCYIQn pic.twitter.com/HVRnTkw1S1

— States of Jersey (@StatesofJersey) June 6, 2017

Chief Nurse Rose Naylor told Express that the scheme had so far been successful, with 17,600 unique visitors to the site since the launch, resulting in 33,000 page views. 40 direct contacts have already been received via email, while 13 candidates are due to attend interviews this month. In addition, the service has six potential recruits from Lisbon and nine from recent open days held in the UK.

As employees, those non-Jersey staff will be granted “licensed” status, with partners awarded licensed or ‘Entitled To Work’ status, “…regardless of their career/experience/qualifications.”

The recruitment drive comes following controversial measures to clamp down on inward migration, which rocketed to 1,500 in 2015, which saw local businesses hit with a new ‘tax’. The States, however, are exempt, with the Health and Social Services department having 286 licensed employees within their ranks according to the latest count.

Mrs Naylor defended the choice to further afield for staff, stating: “When it comes to employing clinical staff, we will always seek to ensure our staff have the right mix of skills, knowledge and experience to provide nursing and midwifery care to the people of Jersey… In order to ensure that we have the right mix of staff, we also need to also recruit nurses and midwives who have experience and – in some cases – specialist qualifications.”

Pictured: Chief Nurse Rose Naylor said that the Health Department were also working on a number of initiatives to promote nursing and midwifery careers to Jersey people.

Nonetheless, she added that the new campaign goes hand-in-hand with measures to promote a career in the sector to islanders:

“We continue to proactively offer local people the opportunity to enter a career in nursing or midwifery through the partnership HSSD has with the University of Chester. There are currently 36 Jersey-based students undergoing this training who are in different stages of their pre-registration Nursing Degree programme. We have also recently agreed with the University to increase the number of places available for the next year group, and in May held open events where potential applicants could learn more about the programme and to meet the lecturing staff.

“The students currently in training will qualify as Registered Adult Nurses, Registered Mental Health Nurses, Registered Children’s Nurses or Registered Midwives.”

Local nurses wishing to return to the profession after a career break are also being nurtured via the ‘Return to Practice’ scheme.

“We know there are a significant number of trained nurses in Jersey who left the profession for various reasons, notably family-related, but are now in a position to return to a career that is every bit as rewarding as the one they left,” Mrs Naylor commented.

Sandra Lamb, one of two nurses due to complete the programme, added: “Having given up my nursing career to raise a family, I had many great memories and this led to me attending an open day and eventually signing up… It’s wonderful to learn how nursing procedures have changed and I feel able to draw on the innate skills from my original training and complement them with new learning.”

Now the Health Department are looking to attract even more with several information-sharing events at the General Hospital on 15 June, 21 June and 1 July.