Ah 2008! A year which began with me being a bit tipsy, not being able to sleep and having a longing to eat a doughnut. No, not sure what sort of omen that is for the coming 12 months. So, I am off until Tuesday when I start the last ever 5 1/2 shifts I will do as a student Nurse. These could also prove to be the last ever shifts I do as a nurse in the NHS if a job does not come crashing around the corner sharpish!
There is a few jobs which I applied for. The dates have only just past for the majority of them so there is still some hope of getting somewhere before the course finishes though at the minute it is hard to feel positive about things. I am having to scour the NHS jobs website looking for job's in the immediate area for any staff nurse jobs which are on the go. There was an advertisement on the university blackboard site where Addenbrookes hospital, Cambridge was looking for staff nurses. Two problems with that. 1) The essential requirement was for current NMC registration, and 2)Cambridge is a long way from Teesside.
Showing posts with label unemployment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label unemployment. Show all posts
Saturday, 5 January 2008
Tuesday, 21 August 2007
Choose not to choose a career
It was never going to be the best of days when it's foggy, and you get really nervous before your driving which went really well until some twat in a white van came speeding around a corner right at the moment when my view was obscured over that of the examiner who made an emergency brake to save the vehicle getting ploughed into by somebody deciding that 40mph in a 20mph zone it fine. Tosser, I fervently hope that from now until the end of time all your itches are unreachable and that somebody writes something obscene in weedkiller on your front lawn.
That aside though, the real reason I am annoyed is that I have to spend £48 on a new test. Seriously here. Let's just examine what would have happened should that van never shown up. Well, for one I would then need a car. Which I don't have any more. So I would have two choices. One, get an old banger for less then £500 that would make me skint, or got to a dealer and have a finance arranged that will mean me paying from now until the end of eternity at 6 billion% APR. That the idea of paying £170 a month is not bad is true- for now. However, in January I will be needed to have a job, so without bursary payments and the employment being questionable to actually land myself with such a burden as that would be the type of decision made by somebody who has the financial sense of an otter. If I don't have a job, I don't have money. The problem there is that I need to get a job. So, where do I look. The easy answer is in my local Acute hospital where indeed there are some jobs at the moment, but 5 months in the NHS can see many changes. So, where else do I go? Well, there was a hospital about 20 miles away that used to serve as a pretty major hospital. That was until the powers that be decided that a really good idea would be to close most of it's facilities and turn it into effectively a rather large first aid post. This, I think is not what I am after. The next main town from that is shedding it staff. It employ's 6000 staff, though to meet budget cuts is cutting 12450 posts giving -6450 staff. This will not leave good job prospects.
So, it's very easy to say "Then emigrate". Yes, I am aware that Australia needs nurses, but without 2 years experience post registration, they will politely tell me where the exit is.
"Move to another area of the country". Yes, because ALL the other counties have just LOADS of posts for newly qualified nurses. Oh, hang on a sec, apparently they don't. Moreover, where am I supposed to get the money for accommodation? Thin air?
So, that's why today is of no bother to me. If I had passed, it would not have made the slightest jot of difference because I cannot afford to buy, nor can I afford to finance, the purchase of a car. Given the fact there are no posts out there, I am not surprised there are reduced numbers of applicants to Nursing. Do you blame them? If somebody was to ask me what to do at university who wanted a high brow course, I would tell them to take Analytical Chemistry or Astro-physics. I have not much of an idea of what they would do save for using a mass spectrometer or utilise astrology, but one things for sure: If you were to waste three years of your life to end up without a job in Northern England, which one would you rather say in the pub: "I studied Astrophysics and I am going on to do my D.Phill at Oxford" or "Worked down't 'ospital".
The NHS may be the biggest employer in the area I live, which goes some way to explain away the high unemployment levels. Some Nurses were saying "Would you do it all again". Given the fact that I have worked my backside off for three years without much hope of a job, I would have to say the answer would be: "No, not really".
That aside though, the real reason I am annoyed is that I have to spend £48 on a new test. Seriously here. Let's just examine what would have happened should that van never shown up. Well, for one I would then need a car. Which I don't have any more. So I would have two choices. One, get an old banger for less then £500 that would make me skint, or got to a dealer and have a finance arranged that will mean me paying from now until the end of eternity at 6 billion% APR. That the idea of paying £170 a month is not bad is true- for now. However, in January I will be needed to have a job, so without bursary payments and the employment being questionable to actually land myself with such a burden as that would be the type of decision made by somebody who has the financial sense of an otter. If I don't have a job, I don't have money. The problem there is that I need to get a job. So, where do I look. The easy answer is in my local Acute hospital where indeed there are some jobs at the moment, but 5 months in the NHS can see many changes. So, where else do I go? Well, there was a hospital about 20 miles away that used to serve as a pretty major hospital. That was until the powers that be decided that a really good idea would be to close most of it's facilities and turn it into effectively a rather large first aid post. This, I think is not what I am after. The next main town from that is shedding it staff. It employ's 6000 staff, though to meet budget cuts is cutting 12450 posts giving -6450 staff. This will not leave good job prospects.
So, it's very easy to say "Then emigrate". Yes, I am aware that Australia needs nurses, but without 2 years experience post registration, they will politely tell me where the exit is.
"Move to another area of the country". Yes, because ALL the other counties have just LOADS of posts for newly qualified nurses. Oh, hang on a sec, apparently they don't. Moreover, where am I supposed to get the money for accommodation? Thin air?
So, that's why today is of no bother to me. If I had passed, it would not have made the slightest jot of difference because I cannot afford to buy, nor can I afford to finance, the purchase of a car. Given the fact there are no posts out there, I am not surprised there are reduced numbers of applicants to Nursing. Do you blame them? If somebody was to ask me what to do at university who wanted a high brow course, I would tell them to take Analytical Chemistry or Astro-physics. I have not much of an idea of what they would do save for using a mass spectrometer or utilise astrology, but one things for sure: If you were to waste three years of your life to end up without a job in Northern England, which one would you rather say in the pub: "I studied Astrophysics and I am going on to do my D.Phill at Oxford" or "Worked down't 'ospital".
The NHS may be the biggest employer in the area I live, which goes some way to explain away the high unemployment levels. Some Nurses were saying "Would you do it all again". Given the fact that I have worked my backside off for three years without much hope of a job, I would have to say the answer would be: "No, not really".
Sunday, 15 April 2007
...and so it goes on, day after day, year in, year out, slime in this ear, slime in that ear, don't you ever yearn for change?
The news that despite the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) at the beginning of conference having its figures of Nursing post reductions scoffed by the government, the fact is there is a large problem with the nursing staffing and the effect on patients.
There are problems with all jobs, and certainly even the private sector has its problems. However, if the checkout operator accidentally charges me 15p more for a broccoli, there is no real disaster, however, if I were to give a patient 15ml too much of a drug, there could be a patients life at stake.
Many point and bemoan the posts being cut. I am fortunate that I can still (sort of) have the time free to study for a different job when I qualify. I quite fancy the Ambulance service, but need a different driving exam to get appropriate licence. I could take access to Medicine and study that...but then you read of the MMC fiasco and think again. I could do law...but I have a conscience. I did have the finance to examine while working in business management...but frankly did not like it. I could join the armed forces, but thanks to my medical conditions would be excused on medical grounds. Which is the issue here. I chose Nursing as I am very knowledgeable and competent with health and anatomy and physiology, and actually WANT to get of my backside and do some work (Yes, I know I may seem to those who meet me to seem cynical but you also know just how good I was with patients and there was that time it was recorded I was more knowledgeable then what was expected of me at the time- and that's not blowing my own trumpet, that people, was recorded officially on a dialogue sheet from the university!).
We have seen this before with the NHS. Job cuts, staffing shortage, wards close, beds short, over and over again. I am tired of reading of ministers burying their head in the sand and using political unspeak to worm out from giving a straight answer. Is it just me who years for change from this cycle of disaster?
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