Specifically, she pleads for a gross salary of 1,700 euros, which the federal government should pay out in a similar way to police students. For the unemployed there should be a 500 euro bonus to the unemployment benefit. Minister of Social Affairs Wolfgang Mckstein (Green) last mentioned the payment during the nursing training as an essential point of the reform in autumn.
In an APA interview in July, Mckstein announced the first steps for the long-awaited care reform for autumn. According to his estimates, there will be a shortage of around 80,000 additional nursing staff by 2030; Rendi-Wagner speaks of 100,000 necessary workers within ten years.
The SP chief warned of a “nursing emergency” in a broadcast over the weekend. “The training to become a nurse must not only be free, it should also be fairly remunerated. We must inspire young people for the nursing profession and roll out the red carpet for them,” pleaded the SP boss for a federally financed training salary. She names the police clerk as a role model. Unemployed people who are retraining for care should receive a “transfer bonus” of 500 euros in addition to unemployment benefits.
According to the Ministry of the Interior, police clerks receive 1,765 euros in their first year of training. In the second year the salary increases to up to 2,370 euros gross for the practical or 2,180 euros for the theoretical course sections.
Rendi-Wagner criticizes that nothing has happened since the last major care reform ten years ago and that Austria only invests half as much in care as the Scandinavian countries.
