International Nurses Day Afternoon Tea

Welcome all to the Cairns Courthouse Gallery. I am grateful that you have found time in your busy lives to gather here to celebrate International Nurses and Midwives Day.

I am so delighted that I can mark this day here in Regional Queensland, following the meeting of the Regional Parliament yesterday.

In welcoming you today, I get the opportunity to recognise all those nurses who work in our hospitals and health services, in aged care, schools and homecare in cities, towns and in the bush, here in the Far North.

I also welcome and acknowledge the presence of representatives of health focused organisations, including some of which I am proud Patron, who employ and work with nurses across the State and I gladly acknowledge the contribution you make to our State.

As a doctor, I have always been acutely aware of the role nurses and midwives perform in the very vanguard of every medical service in Queensland, in Australia, and indeed the whole world.

It is gratifying that the same sense of appreciation is felt more broadly across our society. In a recent annual survey, Doctors, Nurses and Paramedics made up the top three of the most trusted and admired professions in the judgment of Australians.

I don’t need to tell you that nursing is not for the faint hearted! The job is challenging – often confronting and you are expected to achieve more and more each year, often with minimal resourcing. But I really think you should take solace in the fact that your fellow Australians admire you and your profession above almost all others.

International Nurses and Midwives Day falls on the birthday of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing.

The 2022 International Nurses Day theme was ‘Nurses make a Difference’. And this year’s theme is ‘Our Nurses Our Future’. These two themes seem to ‘dovetail’ so well together as the difference you make creates a better future.

And as Governor I have the privilege of speaking on behalf of all Queenslanders, and it is on their behalf that I thank you all for your professionalism, dedication and commitment to the health and wellbeing of us all.   

Thank you, and I look forward to meeting with as many of you as possible over afternoon tea.