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Last week St Joseph’s Home of Compassion in Silverstream was formally handed over to private provider Heritage Lifecare.
Heritage Lifecare has been managing the facility since August 2022, which it has since purchased.
Heritage Lifecare chief executive Norah Barlow said seeing the home close would have been a shame.
“Losing this home and the vital aged care services it provides would have been a huge loss to the community.
“Now with the purchase, St Joseph’s will continue to serve the community. We will be working to ensure the kaupapa of the sisters continue,” Barlow says.
Sisters of Compassion Congregational leader, Sister Margaret Anne Mills is sorry about the change of ownership, but says the new owners’ attitude heartens her.
The handover was the last step of a journey that hit the headlines last August when St Joseph’s Home of Compassion announced its 87-bed rest home in Upper Hutt would close.
Staff levels had been dropping for three years. Two-thirds of the facility’s registered nurses had resigned, they explained.
Poor salaries – $20,000 lower than peers working in hospitals – saw many registered nurses seek alternative employment.
Various immigration issues meant overseas-registered nurses weren’t taking their places.
At St Joseph’s, as elsewhere in New Zealand, the combined issues forced the Sisters’ desperate decision to close the facility.
Last year, when word got out about St Joseph’s, the Upper Hutt community, in particular, was shocked.
Mayor Wayne Guppy said the closure would be “catastrophic for the community”.
Heritage Lifecare’s Norah Barlow agreed. Impressed by the community’s response, initially she decided to partner with Sisters to find solutions to keep St Joseph’s open.
Critically, one solution was readily available. Heritage Lifecare had the resources to deal with the staff shortages.
Soaring Costs
Shortly before Christmas, the Government announced a $200 million-a-year pay-parity funding package to help registered nurses working in the community. These include those in aged-care homes.
The Government is also allowing overseas-trained nurses to join other medical professionals on the “straight to residence” pathway.
It’s expected this will make New Zealand more attractive to overseas nurses.
Home of Compassion chief executive Chris Gallavin says the Sisters have 38 members with an average age in the 70s.
Gallavin says the order is no longer recruiting but remains active and plans to significantly upgrade its soup kitchen and to keep honouring the commitment made by Sister Suzanne Aubert to the people of Wellington, he said.
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