The Registered Nurses Union is getting positive feedback from the Premier’s Office on its proposal to move away from using private agency nurses to fill gaps in rural areas.

President Yvette Coffey says the union has been operating a pilot project for some time involving travel locums – nurses who will sign on for brief periods to fill specific needs.

Now, the RNU is proposing the creation of a dedicated travel team, nurses whose only job will be to travel the province going where the need arises.

“What we’re proposing is this would be their actual permanent, or temp or casual position, and that’s what they would do. They would travel around the province to fill in schedules where there are vacancies.”

The proposal has been put to government and NLHS. She says it’s still not clear how many nurses would be needed for the creation of a permanent mobile unit.

She says they haven’t gotten that far in the discussions yet, but “the Premier really likes it….he’s really gung-ho to get going with this. It’s just a matter of working out the details.”