Bula! to our new team members

Final preparations are underway to welcome our largest intake of personal care workers yet through the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) scheme.

Since 2018, 70 team members have joined Bolton Clarke through the PALM scheme, working at our residential care homes in Maryborough, Bowen, Longreach, Townsville, Zilzie and Bundaberg.

In April, this number will more than double when we welcome 98 personal care workers from Fiji and expand the program into more residential care homes.

The new team members will join us through PALM’s Aged Care Expansion stream and will be based at 17 regional and rural locations across Queensland and New South Wales, including Orange, the Sunshine Coast and northern New South Wales.

To prepare them for their new roles, all team members recently completed a 16-week Certificate III in Individual Support through Alphacrusis University College.

Once they arrive in Australia, they will continue to build their skills through six weeks practical training in residential care homes where they will then be based for the next four years.  

Sara Allotta and Kirwan Sanday from our People and Culture team travelled to Fiji in February to attend the graduates’ celebration ceremony and welcome them to Bolton Clarke.

Sara said the ceremony was particularly special as many graduates had shown great tenacity in completing their certificate.

“Participants worked hard during their studies and some needed to travel up to five hours to attend classes,” she said.

“Their graduation is a significant achievement and they are excited to take their next career step with Bolton Clarke.”

We have a long-standing partnership with the PALM scheme since our first team members from the Pacific Islands came to Longreach in 2018.

Sara said our involvement in the scheme had many benefits, for both participants and for residents in regional and rural locations.

“Our participation enables us to bring caring and committed workers from Pacific Island nations into homes where because of geographic remoteness, it can be difficult to find long-term employees,” Sara explained.

“Their commitment to stay for up to four years provides consistency of care and helps boost our workforce.”

Sara said the team is also recruiting five PALM support officers to help the team members to settle into our homes and communities and provide extra support during their time in Australia.

Featured image: Sara Allotta (second from left) and Kirwan Sanday (centre) met with Fiji Higher Education Commission Director Dr Rohit Kishore and some of our new team members and their trainers in Fiji.