Business News - WA
At Close of Business podcast October 1 2024
(upbeat music) All the latest business news from WA deliver daily. At close of business, news briefing. - Good afternoon and welcome to the At Close of Business podcast. I'm Isabel Vieira with your Tuesday afternoon headlines. Mark McGowan chaired frontier energy shares have plummeted more than 50% after its Warruno solar project was snubbed by the operator of the state's electricity grid. Frontiers Warruno project was not granted reserve capacity credits by the Australian energy market operator for the year from October 1st, 2026. After the market operator ran modeling to determine where the state's energy mix for the period would come from. AEMO revealed last month that frontier was in the running but the company said a reserve capacity surplus combined with the need for certainty on a five-year financing facility, worth up to 215 million apple runer, worked against it, being grounded AEMO capacity credits. In other news, an ambitious plan to source 70 million cubic meters of sand from the sea bed off the Wyndham coast for sale into Asia has been put before the state's Environmental Protection Authority. Dredging company Bascales Australia hopes to use a crew of 25 aboard a 375 meter long offshore vessel to stockpile sand sucked up from the Cambridge Gulf Sea bed. The vessel, which would have capacity for between 75,125,000 cubic meters of sand, would then sail to a delivery point in Asia for use in construction and return to repeat the cycle. Bascales estimated the vessel would operate in the Gulf for 14% of the year or 52 days with no operational activity for the remaining 86% of the time. It hopes to run the project for 15 years, shipping 70 million cubic meters for an estimated 300 million cubic meters in an operating area over that time. Its EPA application is open for a seven day public comment period for the full story. Read online at businessnews.com.au. And lastly, Regis Hotel's plan to build a four-story port accommodation in Fremantle failed to clear a planning hurdle after an assessment panel was unable to decide on the $8 million proposal despite a two-hour meeting. An entity owned by Regis Hotel's proposed to build a backpacker's accommodation on 19 Essex Street in Fremantle. The Metro Inner Development Assessment Panel today voted to defer the application for up to 120 days. After members were unable to solve parking and scale issues during an almost two-hour meeting. The proposed tourist development would comprise of 80 rooms with 247 beds, communal dining, kitchen bathroom and bar areas. To read more, visit the business news website. That's all from me up next on the podcast. I speak to Nadia Budihadro about the first cohort of nursing students from AMA WA's program. I'm Michael Thompson. Join the nine news team for the day's biggest stories and breaking news from across Perth, Australia and the world. The most trusted reporters on the ground with exclusive stories you won't see anywhere else. Plus WA's most comprehensive weather and the latest sports news with the inside scoop on the AFL. Finance editor Chris Kohler also brings you the latest news on business from interest rates to the stock market. Nine news, your news, nightly at six, on nine and nine now. Welcome back to the At Clothes of Business podcast. I'm Isabelle Fiera and today I'm joined by Nadia Budihadro, who wrote about AMA College's nursing school in the recent edition of the magazine. Nadia, you wrote that they reached a milestone. Tell us about that. - Yeah, so the Australian Medical Association of WA, AMA, WA, they welcome 29 graduates and they're the first cohort of its nursing diploma graduates. So the program only launched in February 2023 and takes a maximum of 30 students. It's an 18 month program and it's a vocational, very hands on sort of an alternative to the university pathway. And it's really interesting because the AMA only receive international accreditation to get overseas students in February 2020 and we know what happened then the start of the pandemic. Although I have spoken to AMA, WA Chief Executive Benny and he mentioned that it didn't really go, you know, the work that they've done to get the international accreditation didn't go to waste because they end up bringing both international and domestic students in this first cohort of the nursing diploma. So really interesting, they've started a new program and they've just welcomed their first cohort of grads. - Very exciting and so what's the aim of the program? - So the AMA WA wants to produce industry ready nurses. The program, that's the 18 month program, it's very, I guess, the making it as close as possible to the actual medical facilities. So a simulation of like six bed unit, there's mannequins as a little bit scary actually in the photo, but I guess it's very hands on and very much a replica of what is out there. And the labor shortage is, I guess it's documented for any sector, but the nation nursing shortage as well is no secret. The research by Health Workforce Australia estimated a shortfall of 100,000 nurses by 2025 and 123,000 by 2030. So the AMA WA Nursing School graduates would be, I guess, more equipped and more ready. But in speaking to AMA WA people for this story, I realize that there are two different, there's a distinction between enrolled nurses and registered nurses. So the diploma in the AMA WA nursing program, it's training to become registered nurses, sorry, it's training to become enrolled nurses, but then you still have to do further study and further training to become a registered nurse. Although in saying that going through diploma, you get 12 months off the registered nurse course. So it's sort of, in a way, not fast track, but I guess give a little bit of a leg up for students who want to become a registered nurse later. - Okay, so can you start work straight away or do you have to do the extra-- - You can, you can start work straight away, but I think there's things that a registered nurse are allowed to do that an enrolled nurse can't. So I think it's like a different level of medical, like different levels of medical practitioners, I think it's the same here with the nursing and their responsibilities. The first cohort of graduates, as I mentioned, is so 46% of them are going to continue uni for their registered nurse course. And that's according to the AMA WA's nursing head of discipline, Morag Wauverditch. And yeah, so that's really interesting to know that distinction in our medical, in our health professions. And the fact that there's this pathway for them to be a bit more industry ready and to sort of close that gap in the labor shortage in the sector. - Yeah, absolutely. And so what's next? - The AMA WA actually is gearing up to double the intake of students based on, I guess, the success of this program, even though they've only just welcomed their first cohort of graduates. Instead of just 30 students a semester, they're going to open it to 30 students a term. So that's four terms in a year, as opposed to just two semesters. And at the time of writing, I think they still had some final tick of accreditation waiting from some authorities, but they're expecting January 2025 start for this double intake. And another thing as well, so apparently there's a lot of students wanting to do placements from, you know, from TAFE courses, university courses, and they are usually semester based. So doing it a term by term base, I think makes it AMA WA said, could give them sort of that advantage. So yeah, really interesting to hear an alternative pathway of education for nursing and one that sort of perhaps puts us on the map even for the country. - Yeah, absolutely. And like you said, getting people into the workforce as soon as possible is obviously very important. Well, listeners can check out the full article in the latest edition of the Business News magazine or read it online today at businessnews.com.au. Nadia, thanks for joining us today. - Thank you. - The latest business news delivered daily. Subscribe and rate the show, wherever you listen to your podcasts. For all the latest business news, visit businessnews.com.au. (upbeat music) [BLANK_AUDIO]