Health P.E.I. spent about $28.5 million on unbudgeted travel nurses in the 2024-25 fiscal year, according to the auditor general’s latest report, raising concerns in that office as well as with the Official Opposition.

The report, released last week, notes that the “significant expenditure” — triple what the province spent the year prior — was not a part of the provincial budget.

Travel nurses come from outside P.E.I. and are hired by a private agency to fill vacancies on a temporary basis, usually at a higher pay rate than most salaried nurses hired by the province. Health P.E.I. currently has contracts with 10 travel nurse agencies.

The AG’s report notes the health authority’s savings through vacant salaried nursing positions didn’t cover the costs of those travel nurses. 

“That was what we were trying to raise,” Auditor General Darren Noonan said in an interview with CBC News. “If you know you’re going to use travel nurses, then you need to budget accordingly.”

Noonan said his office is conducting a performance audit on travel nurses, which he hopes to have finalized by late fall or early next spring.

Jill Burridge, P.E.I.’s minister of finance and affordability, said the province views travel nurses as “an urgency” in “the case of an operational pressure.”

“These are the things that we can’t ignore. So if we need travel nurses in those places to keep them standing up and keep them running, there’s not much decision in that. You have to do that,” Burridge said. 

“But as a government, we budget for permanent full-time nurses or part-time nurses, whatever the case may be. And that’s where we want to see our dollars spent.”

She added that UPEI has a full slate of graduating nurses, and the university is working to get those graduates into the P.E.I. health system.

Burridge said recruitment efforts to hire more permanent staff are ongoing.

Are they doing some real work here or is it smoke and mirrors again?– Robert Mitchell, P.E.I. Liberal leader

P.E.I. Liberal Leader Robert Mitchell said the province knew it would need to rely on travel nurses, and that it’s “recklessness” for government to say it didn’t budget for that need.

“If it’s not there, you can’t ask questions about it,” Mitchell said. “This is where it shows up, a year later when you’re looking at all the special warrants that went through, all the extra spending.”

Noonan’s report warns of growing debt and an aging population in the province, as well as rising health-care costs. The AG has called on government to “rein in” its spending.

The governing Progressive Conservatives announced in December that the projected deficit had nearly doubled to $367.4 million. The province has also approved nearly $150 million in unbudgeted spending, meaning the deficit will be even higher when the new budget is delivered, likely in March

“By the time they get there with the budget, we’ll see, that’ll tell the tale,” Mitchell said. “Are they doing some real work here or is it smoke and mirrors again?”

Committee being created to look at government spending on P.E.I.

The P.E.I. government is setting up a new committee to look at government spending. It comes as the province is grappling with a growing deficit. Wayne Thibodeau breaks down the numbers.

The P.E.I. Nurses’ Union said in a statement it had raised concerns about travel nursing costs to the auditor general’s office last year. The union agrees that the findings in the 2026 report raise more questions.

“The real issue we’ve been most concerned about is why we have been forced to rely so heavily on travel nurses in the first place,” the statement reads.

“P.E.I. Nurses’ Union has been advocating for stable, permanent staffing solutions that strengthen our public health-care system and provide continuity of care for patients and we will continue to do so.”