CRANAplus wel­comes the announce­ment by the Gov­ern­ment that it will estab­lish a Com­mon­wealth Prac Pay­ment worth $319.50 a week to sup­port nurs­ing and mid­wifery stu­dents to under­take manda­to­ry unpaid work­place placements.

The pay­ment will be avail­able from 1 July 2025, with fur­ther details to be released in the upcom­ing Budget.

The Prac Pay­ment will allow more stu­dents to explore their inter­est in rur­al and remote nurs­ing and mid­wifery, help­ing to grow the future work­force, CRANAplus CEO Lin­da Kens­ing­ton says.

“This pay­ment is a ter­rif­ic out­come. It will assist nurs­ing and mid­wifery stu­dents to expe­ri­ence remote health where pre­vi­ous­ly this was finan­cial­ly impos­si­ble for many – or only pos­si­ble at sig­nif­i­cant per­son­al cost,” Ms Kens­ing­ton says.

“The work­force ben­e­fits are sig­nif­i­cant. We know that stu­dents who under­take a place­ment in remote Aus­tralia are more like­ly to return as qual­i­fied nurs­es and mid­wives. Their expe­ri­ences as stu­dents can also help them to thrive when they return as employees.”

Nurs­ing and mid­wifery stu­dents under­tak­ing place­ments in remote loca­tions often have to trav­el thou­sands of kilo­me­tres, pay for their own accom­mo­da­tion, and con­tend with high­er costs, lim­it­ing participation.

CRANAplus runs a schol­ar­ship pro­gram that pro­vides assis­tance to stu­dents in these cir­cum­stances, but it is only able to sup­port a small por­tion of eli­gi­ble appli­cants every year.

“The Prac Pay­ment is a wel­come step, hope­ful­ly one of many towards a sys­tem where stu­dents who dream of work­ing in remote Aus­tralia, where health­care needs are great­est, find the road open to them,” Ms Kens­ing­ton says.

“The pay­ment will assist stu­dents to under­take remote place­ments by con­tribut­ing to their costs, but urban place­ments will remain the more cost-effec­tive option for most students. 

“The oth­er part of the equa­tion is to cre­ate addi­tion­al remote place­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties and to ensure they include struc­tured sup­port and super­vi­sion, prepa­ra­tion for cul­tur­al­ly safe prac­tice, and oppor­tu­ni­ties to work with­in a mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary team.

“We look for­ward to work­ing with Gov­ern­ment, health ser­vices and uni­ver­si­ties to sup­port the roll-out of the Prac Pay­ment. Look­ing even fur­ther for­ward, we stand ready to work with all stake­hold­ers to make remote place­ments even more acces­si­ble to students.”

More about CRANAplus

CRANAplus (Coun­cil of Remote Area Nurs­es of Aus­tralia +) is the peak pro­fes­sion­al body for the remote and iso­lat­ed health work­force. Our not-for-prof­it, mem­ber­­­ship-based organ­i­sa­tion pro­vides edu­ca­tion, men­tal health sup­port, career sup­port, and pro­fes­sion­al ser­vices to nurs­es, mid­wives, and oth­er health pro­fes­sion­als to ensure the deliv­ery of safe, high-qual­i­­­ty pri­ma­ry health­care to remote and iso­lat­ed areas of Australia. 

Media con­tact

Sam Richards
Com­mu­ni­ca­tions & Mem­ber­ship Man­ag­er
(07) 4047 6446
communications@​crana.​org.​au