Student nurses to receive grant worth €5.4m...

... That’s a payment of €100 per week

AROUND 4,500 s t udent nurses are set to receive placement grants worth €100 per week after allegations of exploitation during the Covid19 pandemic. The Pandemic Placement Grant, which would last until the pandemic ends, could cost up to €5.4million a year. It was one of the recommendations made in a review commissioned by the Department of Health and carried out by Professor Tom Collins. The proposed measure comes a month after the Government controversially voted against a motion to pay student nurses on placements during the pandemic. The Collins review recommends that the Pandemic Placement Grant be paid net of tax from this month until the end of the Covid-19 pandemic. Eligible students should also retain their existing placement allowances of €50 per week, allocated to cover travel and accommodation costs.

As well as this, they should remain entitled to any Student Universal Support Ireland (SUSI) grants and Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP) benefits they may have claimed.

If implemented from now until the end of the academic year in June, the grant would cost €3million. However that cost would rise to €5.4million if the payments are backdated to last September – as recommended in the review.

Traditionally, student nurses and midwives in Years 1-3 have to do hospital placements ranging from nine to 12 weeks. During this period they are considered ‘in training’ and not paid.

Fourth-year students do a 36week internship where they are rostered and paid between €21,700 and €22,200.

On March 26, following pressure from the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation ( INMO), former health minister Simon Harris said student nurses and midwives completing placements during the pandemic would be paid. They would also be offered contracts as healthcare assistants and be paid accordingly. However, this scheme came to an end in August, and the INMO has since been in talks with the Government on the issue.

€22,200 The maximum pay for fourth-year students