Northern Health is committed to a workplace culture that fosters diversity and equality. To help support our vision of a healthier community, our staff and volunteers reflect the community that we serve, and are supported by a workplace which is inclusive and empowers everyone to contribute their best.

“When we talk about diversity at Northern Health, we recognise and celebrate the many people who use and deliver our services. Their different characteristics, backgrounds, abilities, beliefs and needs create unique opportunities and challenges,” said Michelle Fenwick, Executive Director, People and Culture.

“However, it is not enough to acknowledge and celebrate diversity. When we talk about inclusion, we are committing to work with this diversity, creating an open, respectful culture and directly involving people at all stages of their health care.”

“Our goal at Northern Health is to reflect the diverse community we serve and create a workplace where everyone feels included. We will embrace the individual skills, experiences and perspectives that our staff bring and harness these to deliver an improved patient experience and service delivery,” Michelle said.

Emiliano Zucchi, Director, Transcultural and Language Services, said, “To me, diversity is synonymous with human being because we are all diverse in one or many ways. Some types of diversity  are overt, others less so, but they are all deserving of the deepest respect. Diversity makes us unique, the more diverse we are as a society, the more familiar with the ‘other’ we become, the richer human beings we become.”

“Often racism, sexism or any kind of prejudice is triggered by lack of education, lack of exposure to different cultures, to different ways of doing things,” Emilano said.

Karen Bryant, Senior Aboriginal Liaison Officer, said Narrun Wilip-giin is saddened by the racial injustices highlighted recently across the world and in Aboriginal Australians daily lives.

“Australia is a very multi-cultural country, people’s differences and the colour of their skin should be irrelevant and everyone should be treated with respect, irrespective of culture or religion,” said Karen.

“The colour of your skin should not be a crime! It’s time to make the change. If you get this right for Aboriginal people, then you get it right for everyone!”