Grievance Debate

Nurses and Midwives

Ms COOK (Hurtle Vale) (15:06): Today, I rise and welcome to parliament nursing and midwifery colleagues. We have some healthcare trailblazers, movers and shakers in our midst this afternoon for a belated parliamentary celebration of both international midwives and nurses days. Our midwives were honoured this year with the theme 'Midwives: defenders of women's rights', which is a wonderful way to acknowledge the advocacy role that midwives play defending, protecting and standing up for the rights of women, girls and midwives around the world.

Given that some of the debates we are currently having in this parliament directly and disproportionately affect women in respect of decriminalisation of both sex work and abortion, the theme is poignant. I look forward to drawing strength from my friends, who have led so many reforms in midwifery practice during their collective decades, as I navigate what will no doubt be challenging debate, chasing reform and equal rights for all women in our community who face incredible adversity—equal rights for all women.

Over the past 40 years, not only have our midwives, these amazing clinicians, led the transition of nursing from a trade-level career that was learnt on the job to a profession, a profession with tertiary status, but these women and some men have also gone on to lobby and demand that midwifery become a separate tertiary profession. Congratulations to all of you.

Midwifery is now one of the most highly sought after and competitive tertiary courses in our universities. The theme for nurses this year, 'A voice to lead: health for all', is highly relevant to the work that we as elected representatives of the Labor Party do here in parliament. We take very seriously the need to ensure that no matter where you are born, who you are born to and where you live, you have access to the very best health care—health care that is free. Health care for all is an aspirational statement, but in our community of opportunities and riches it should and must be a reality.

We have access to the evidence on how to achieve this reality. Our tertiary institutions, and the nurse-led research attached to them, are amongst the best in the world. Some of the teaching facilities that our students now have access to are quite incredible. Recently, the shadow minister for health and wellbeing, Chris Picton, and I visited the UniSA virtual skills labs, where students can immerse themselves in the lives of virtual patients and help inform choices that will provide the basis for learning like we have never seen before. Do not get me wrong: my training days were a rich and diverse experience at The QEH nursing school in the eighties, some of the best days of my life, but, honestly, the facilities were nothing compared with what is available to enhance and support the learning experiences of today. I am pretty jealous, to be honest.

Globally, we have more knowledge than we have ever had before. We have communication across the globe that we have never seen before. Because of this, we can share knowledge in the here and now and use it to achieve healthcare outcomes that we have never seen. How do we achieve equality, equity, access and choice in health care within our community? We do this by sticking to our convictions, delivering care which is only based on evidence and the guidance of the best clinical leadership in the world. We do not achieve this by being quiet. Keep rattling the cages, keep lobbying and stick to your guns. Be the leaders for change. Be the leaders for our community.

Our community has amongst it many who are seemingly voiceless, but they are not; it is because we do not yet know how to listen. These people need advocating for more than others. There are those who do not have shelter at night. We have families facing a crisis of food insecurity. There are children who do not have love, children who do not have access to role models to guide and shape them.

As nurses, you help to give voice to the voiceless through listening and witnessing their life journeys and giving strength to those who need it. You reach out, you seek these people and you fight for them. Against the odds, you fight for all people in our community. It is because of you that there is hope—hope for equality, equity and health for all. We owe this hope to you, the trailblazers who have been part of the teaching and clinical evolution, the nurse leaders who have pushed the boundaries at all levels of their professional journey, the clinicians of today.

Thank you for all you do in our community. I am proud to represent you, to be part of you, to fight with you and for you and to be a voice for you in parliament.

The SPEAKER: My sister is a nurse, so I must be careful here, but I remind members of the gallery that applauding in the gallery is out of order.