The PSA says Health NZ is breaching two collective agreements that commit it to take all reasonable and practicable steps to fill vacancies as soon as they occur. As of late September, 35 nursing and allied health roles at the Mason Clinic were unfilled, some since 2025.
“The Government is leaving a secure forensic service short-staffed to make its budget numbers work. That’s a dangerous gamble with the safety of patients, staff and the public,” said Fleur Fitzsimons, National Secretary for the Public Service Association Te Pūkenga Here Tikanga Mahi.
“The Mason Clinic cares for people with serious mental illness who have been charged with or convicted of serious offences. You cannot do that work safely with dozens of roles left empty.
“Health NZ has told us these roles aren’t being filled because there’s no approval to fill them – and that recruitment only goes ahead where a district is within budget. That’s the Government’s funding squeeze in black and white, and it breaks commitments Health NZ signed up to.
“We’ve raised this repeatedly since March. Staff told us in July they were at breaking point. When we wrote again in September, Health NZ didn’t reply until we chased it a month later.
“It is not limited to the Mason Clinic and the problem is being aggravated by internal transfers of staff to other mental health units creating vacancies that leave other units short staffed.
“Every empty role piles more pressure on the nurses, psychologists and allied health staff – more fatigue, more burnout, and less time for the therapeutic work that helps patients recover and keeps communities safe.
“This is the same short-sighted thinking by this government that we see right across health: leave roles empty to balance the books and let someone else deal with the consequences.
“This is typical of a government that continues to underfund health and that’s why we need to change the Government this Saturday to one that properly invests in public health.”
The PSA is seeking a determination that Health NZ has breached the collective agreements and a compliance order requiring it to fill vacancies as the agreements require.
