Today we celebrate the unsung heroes of our health service – our cleaners! Today is World Cleaners Day, and is an opportunity to recognise the important role our cleaners play at Northern Health, protecting both staff and public.

It is no exaggeration to say that in these challenging times of COVID-19, our cleaners play an important role in keeping us safe and healthy, for which we are very grateful.

As the Minister for Health, Jenny Mikakos said,  “I want to give a big shout out to all the cleaners working across our public health services, in retail, public transport, schools, offices and other public buildings. Hygiene has never been so important so thank you for the important work you’re all doing keeping us all safe.”

Our cleaners at Northern Health comprise of both our Personal Service Assistants (PSA) and ISS Facility Services, with each team complementing the other.

Says Basil Ireland, Chief Financial Officer, “Our cleaners have shown terrific work ethics and modelling how to behave in a crisis – and get on with the job!”

Speaking of ISS staff, Basil say,s “I would like to commend the tremendous work that ISS staff are doing at Northern Health during the pandemic.  In particular the Emergency Department staff have been terrific. At the height of the pandemic in early April, the staff would rightly have been concerned about their own health yet they bravely performed their duties and kept our staff and patients safe from infections with their diligence.”

As for our PSA’s, today we will be launching our new recognition program for our PSA workforce, and will also announce the recipients of the Hardworking Health Service Worker Scholarships.

The Hardworking Health Services Staff Scholarship Training Fund was established to support the careers of our frontline health service workers and delivers on the 2018 Victorian Government election commitment and 2019-20 Victorian State Budget announcement.

Following a highly competitive process, Northern Health received funding to provide eight scholarships to staff to complete either a Certificate V in Business or a Certificate in Numeracy and Literacy Studies. Six of our PSAs have been awarded a Certificate IV in Business scholarship and two PSAs have been awarded a Certificate in Numeracy and Literacy scholarship.

In addition, this week our PSA’s are being invited to attend a Therapeutic Relaxation And Enhanced Awareness Training or ‘Treat’®, a self care and self awareness workplace program, giving our PSA’s a well- deserved time to rest and recover.

Join us today on World Cleaners Day in cheering our cleaners, our heroes.

Featured main picture shows from bottom left Gavin Steele,  Paul Trevana, Sonja Stamatovska, Karen Luchetta and Sue (Student).