Minns ministers must stop misleading on paramedic pay

The Minns government is misleading the public with deliberately inflated figures about what paramedics are paid, as it risks mass resignation and deregistration of one of its most skilled but underpaid workforces. In a note circulated to media, the Government has claimed its pay offer would lift a first year paramedic’s take home pay from $123,594 to $137,683. This is not a figure that has been put to the HSU and nor it accurate. The offer put to the Union proposes a paltry 11.4 per cent, four year increase to the base pay of first year paramedics, from $74,364 to $82,877. The so-called ‘take home’ pay figure quoted to media for a year six paramedic of $132,544 is also inaccurate. Under the increase the Government actually has proposed – a 25.8 per cent /four year increase to base pay of a year six paramedic – NSW paramedics would still be paid at least six per cent less than their Queensland colleagues. “The people of NSW need and deserve an ambulance workforce they can rely upon. Unfortunately, the workforce is crumbling. Paramedics literally can’t afford to keep doing their jobs,” HSU NSW Secretary Gerard Hayes said. “The inadequate offer we received this morning does not fix the problem. Under this proposal we will never catch up with Queensland. And that means paramedics will just keep leaving. “More than 500 paramedics have left NSW in the last six months. Many hundreds more will leave in the next six months. “Paramedics are more than ambulance drivers. While politicians pose and preen, paramedics save lives. They earn a base salary of $79,000 while a back bench MP earns 100k more.” The HSU pay claim in this dispute is a 20 per cent catch up to achieve parity with Queensland, additional to whatever base public sector pay rise exists at the time.