Newly qualified nurses (NQNs) are choosing to work in coffee shops and look for non-nursing posts before they’ve received their pin because there are ‘no jobs’ available when they graduate.
NQNs and nursing students shared their struggle to find any relevant nursing jobs after they graduated during an emergency debate at the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) Congress, held in Liverpool this week.
Alex Knight, RCN student ambassador, said NQNs are being ‘met with silence’ after they complete their nurse training at university.
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‘There’s simply no jobs.
‘This isn’t an isolated experience; it’s becoming the norm,’ he said.
Mr Knight cautioned that student’s challenge in finding work was not a ‘workforce planning issue’ but the result of a ‘national funding crisis’.
‘The responsibility lies firmly with central government,’ he added.
Mr Knight said he was already looking for jobs outside of nursing before he has even received his Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) registration details.
Another newly qualified nurse, Karen Lowe, described how students from cohort had begun working in Costa because they were unable to find a job in nursing.
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Hannah Pai, a newly qualified nurse with a master’s degree in mental health nursing, said she was forced to apply to jobs that she knew she would ‘not be able to afford to live in’ on a Band 5 nursing salary.
She recently began working as a mental health nurse at a hospital which is a two-hour car journey away from where she lives.
Ms Pai said she was ‘guaranteed’ a job when she started her Master’s, but said there were only two jobs available for 20 students when she graduated, not including the undergraduate students who were applying for the same roles.
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The emergency debate, which was made into the resolution ‘That this meeting of the RCN Congress asked RCN Council to lobby the UK Government, NHS and independent social care providers to develop a sustainable strategy to address the shortage of roles for newly registered nurses’, was passed overwhelmingly.
