Important Update on Nursing Job Vacancies in UK and Ireland

UK and Ireland are recruiting nurses NOW and offering work permits and working visas which can lead to permanent residence and an EU passport.

Earlier this week I informed you that UK Tier 2 Work Permits and Irish work permits are available now for non-EU trained nurses living in the UK or overseas. This could include qualified nurses from any country as long as they meet the UK NMC (Nursing and Midwifery Council) or the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Ireland (NMBI) requirements - experience, English language.

Hospitals and Nursing Homes are paying generous salaries and allowances to Nurses, as they desperately need staff. UK hospital salaries start at around £25,000 pa and Nursing Homes pay up to £30,000 pa.

Irish Nursing Homes are offering up to 18 Euros per hour once you are fully qualified to work as a nurse in Ireland, which is a member of the European Union and not to be confused with Northern Ireland which is part of the UK.

In order for a non-EU trained nurse to work as a nurse in the UK, you must achieve a minimum IELTS score of 7.00 in all bands and pass the NMC Part 1 online test. Whilst this is proving difficult for some candidates, the system is actually more straightforward than the old 0NP adaptation programme it replaced. 

My tip is to prepare for the test like you would for any other exam. Read IELTS study guides or attend classes, as this is not an easy English test. There is no point in applying or sending a CV to me for a UK nursing job unless you have scored 7.00 in ALL bands.

However, the Irish NMBI system is less stringent and whilst you need an overall IELTS band score of 7, you can still qualify with a lower score in some areas.

Full details of IELTS Academic - minimum scores for working as a nurse trained outside the EU/EEA in Ireland.

Listening  6.5
Reading   6.5
Writing    7.0
Speaking 7.0

Overall   7.0 

Unlike the UK, which changed its rules on 19 January 2016, Ireland has NO English language requirement for EU/EEA nurses or nurses who trained and qualified in the EU/EEA. 

The UK now requires IELTS 7.00 for EU nurses, which appears to conflict with European free movement treaties.

See more at: http://www.nmbi.ie/Registration/Trained-outside-Ireland/English-Language-Requirements#sthash.TqQtb3qM.dpuf

The Republic of Ireland does not have the same restrictions on working for Croatian citizens, as imposed in the UK.

This is a window of opportunity for nurses who want to work in the UK or Ireland - and it will not stay open for long.

I have received hundreds of emails from nurses all over the world asking about the process for working in the UK.  

In case you missed it, here’s a summary of what to do if you are a non-EU nurses and want to work in the UK as a qualified registered nurse without the need to study here for a nursing degree:

1. You must be a registered nurse in your own country (surprising how many enquiries I receive from non-nurses or care workers who cannot qualify for a UK work permit).
2. You must have 3 years plus of pre-registration training and practice.
3. You must obtain an overall band score of 7.00 or more - in all subjects - on an IELTS English exam (no exceptions). 
4. You should register online with the NMC
5. Pass the first stage online test (CBT).
6. Assuming you pass the test, you will need to get through a UK-based assessment - Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) before you can be licensed by the NMC to practice as a nurse.
7. You need to find an employer to sponsor your work permit and UK visa.

NMC fees for the 4 stage application process:

Application for nursing/midwifery £140
Part 1 test of competence (CBT) £130
Part 2 test of competence (OSCE) £992
Admission onto our register £153
Total £1415

Some employers may pay for or advance a loan to cover part or all of the above costs.

For full details, check the NMC website http://www.nmc.org.uk/ and see if you will qualify for UK registration. 

I can find a SPONSORING EMPLOYER AND JOB for you in the UK - and help you get a work permit - if you have IELTS 7.00 and preferrably have started the NMC process. If you are a nurse and want to work in the UK. email your CV and IELTS results.

Ireland are also recruiting nurses and offering work permits and unlike the UK there are NO English language test for EU trained nurses.

Do you really a need to migrate?

It has long been assumed that people in poorer countries must emigrate to richer countries to succeed and earn a living for their family.  However, this is no longer be the first choice for everyone. There has been a substantial economic shift during the past decade helped on by the technological and information revolutions. 

Millions of people are now choosing to work from home and avoid the pain of leaving their families behind for employment thousands of miles away. Major outsourcing platforms like Upwork.com and Fivver offer anyone with a laptop and an internet connection the chance to earn a living working from the comfort of their own home anywhere in the world. 

We can also trade stocks and shares or foreign exchange (FOREX) using inexpensive real-time technology that would have previously only been available to large institutions.

Students can also earn legitimate degrees from major universities online at a fraction of the cost of travelling abroad.

Making money with home-based businesses like Affiliate Marketing - selling other people's products for a commission - now offers huge opportunities in the home-based business economy and I believe it is only just getting started. 

Companies like Amazon and Ebay offer affiliate marketing programs, albeit for small commissions meaning you have to sell a lot of products to make serious money. With some schemes, you will need quite a bit of technical knowledge to set up your own websites, systems and marketing campaigns.

More and more people are looking to ditch the daily grind of long commute, doing a job they hate and spending half their lives trading their time for money and working to make someone else rich.

Replacing your salary from a job is easier said than done, right? Well, maybe. I recently came across a company which offers stay-at-home workers who want to escape the rat race the opportunity to earn affiliate commission without the need to set up websites or possess any technical knowledge. The company trains their students online through a structured series of modules and webinars as well as live support and mentoring.

The initial training, reports and information on how to escape the 9-5 life, join the new rich and live the laptop lifestyle is downloadable and totally free. Check it out, click here.

Recruiting International Nurses 'Frustrating And Expensive' NHS Chief Claims

An NHS Chief has branded the recruitment of overseas nurses as "distracting, frustrating and expensive" despite employing 300 nurses from the Philippines and the EU in the last year, the BBC reports.

Dr Keith McNeil, the Chief Executive of Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, called for NHS officials to "figure out" what resources were needed to improve UK recruitment and train more home grown nurses.

Last year more than 7,500 international nurses were recruited and registered to work in the UK from countries such as Spain, Croatia and The Philippines.

The majority of overseas nurses coming to work in the UK are from the EU, while the number of nurses from outside of Europe has declined. EU nurses (apart from Croatian Citizens) do not need Tier 2 Work Permits and can generally gain NMC PIN numbers without the need to undergo addition ONP training.

Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) figures confirm that the recruitment of overseas staff to the UK is on the rise as severe shortages hit NHS hospitals and Nursing Home groups.

In the last year, Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has taken on 303 foreign nurses - half from the Philippines and the rest largely from Italy, Spain and Portugal.

Candidates at recruitment event in Portugal

In an interview with the BBC Dr McNeil said: "Nurses are the backbone of the NHS. You can't run services effectively in an acute hospital like this without adequate numbers of trained nursing staff.

"It's distracting, frustrating and expensive to do international recruitment. It would be nice not to have to do it... [and] to have a more targeted approach."

He added: "We don't have enough home-grown nurses, but we know the demographics. The health service has to figure out what resources are needed for our activity. We need proper planning; I think the people at Health Education England are doing that now.

"At least doing it now means avoiding having to do this in the years to come."

Nursing experts fear that shortages could be fuelled in the coming years by retirement among the baby-boomer generation, and limits on the number of skilled workers from outside the EU who are allowed into the UK.

NHS Employers has issued guidance to hospitals Trusts who may be considering international nurse recruitment.

Addenbrooke's estimates that it costs £3,000 to recruit each nurse from the EU, plus new arrivals are awarded £400 their first month's accommodation, so long as they stay for 18 months.

EU nurses had to be sent on a language course if they need to boost their conversational skills in English, as well as being given 10 weeks of mentoring support in the hospital to help their technical and clinical language.

On the plus side, the hospital admits that the overseas recruitment drive is paying dividends, because it is now using fewer temporary staff from agencies and saving hundreds of thousands of pounds.

A number of large Trusts regularly spend several million pounds every year on agency staff to cover shifts they cannot fill from their own staff bank.

The head of nurse’s union, the Royal College of Nursing, Dr Peter Carter, said: "Last year there were 57,000 applicants for 20,000 nurse training posts.

"Isn't that a matter of huge regret that you've got people in the four countries of the UK who want to train as nurses. They're being turned away, while we're going off and raiding the often impoverished workforce of other countries."

He added: "It's hugely regrettable and the UK is not exactly covering itself in glory in this."

But the organisation now in charge of nurse training, Health Education England, says it has increased places by 14% in two years.

A spokesperson said: "The number of nurses in the NHS is a matter of public and political comment, and HEE has responded to those concerns.

"HEE increased adult nurse commissions significantly in its first year and increased them again the following year.

"And we launched the Return to Practice campaign which has already started 1,300 experienced nurses on their journey back into the NHS. [Some] 160 of these have successfully completed training and are now employed."

Nursing agencies, such as Dolphin Care and Concept care Solutions have been supplying both temporary and permanent nurses to the NHS and private sector for many years.

A spokesman said: “The staffing crisis is similar to the shortages experiences in 1999-2000 when we recruited international nurses in their thousands from The Philippines and India.

“Whilst the initial cost may be high, international recruitment is a more permanent solution than using expensive agency staff, which the government wants to reduce.

“Of course we need to train more UK nurses for UK nursing jobs, but this will take years and in the meantime thousands of nurses are retiring, gaining promotion or going abroad to take higher paid jobs in the Middle East, Australia or the USA and Canada.”

Concept Care Solutions is on the LPP Framework to supply International nurses to the NHS. They are currently supplying nurses from Spain, Portugal, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria and The Philippines.