The Australian College of Nursing (ACN) welcomes the Australian Government's announcement of new streamlined processes for registration of overseas nurses, with nurses coming to work in Australia from comparable countries having their assessment and registration time cut by as much as 6-12 months.
ACN CEO, Adjunct Professor Kathryn Zeitz FACN, said the changes will help bolster the nursing workforce to meet growing community need for high-quality health services.
"Australia has a long history of attracting nurses to work in Australia," Adjunct Professor Zeitz said.
"Overseas nurses will now wait a shorter time for their registration and ability to practise here, but they must still meet the same regulatory requirements as Australian-trained nurses – ensuring the high standards of safety and quality of care in this country.
"While improving the process to shorten the time for overseas nurse registration is a good move, our priority must still be to educate and retain more home-grown nurses and midwives.
"ACN has made practical and achievable recommendations in our Pre-Budget Submission that will help all governments achieve their nursing workforce goals.
"The key is developing strategies to attract more people into nursing and providing rewarding life-long career pathways to keep nurses in the profession.
"Enabling nurses, nurse practitioners, and midwives to work to their full scope - as proposed in the recommendations of the Unleashing the Potential of our Health Workforce – Scope of Practice Review - will benefit patients, communities, and the health system," Adjunct Professor Zeitz said.
The overseas nurses coming to Australia provide a diversified workforce and include nurses from New Zealand, Canada, Ireland, Singapore, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America.
The ACN Pre-Budget Submission 2025-26 is at https://www.acn.edu.au/advocacy-policy/2025-2026-pre-budget-submission
