Budget 2025: What It Means for Nurses

The Bottom Line

Budget 2025 carves out $20 million specifically for nurse practitioners and establishes a new $322 million Primary Care Alberta agency that puts nurse practitioners on integrated care teams with family physicians and pharmacists. Total health spending reaches $24 billion, but health entity compensation grows just 1.9% against 2.6% projected inflation. The system is being restructured into four agencies, which means opportunity for expanded scope but also organizational change while you are already stretched thin.

Top Measures That Affect You

1. $20 million in 2025-26 for nurse practitioners to bring greater capacity to the primary care system. This is dedicated funding within primary care to expand nurse practitioner roles.

2. Primary Care Alberta established with a $322 million budget in 2025-26. This new agency will coordinate primary care provider teams including family physicians, nurse practitioners, and pharmacists to provide comprehensive, timely access to high-quality primary care, including after-hours and rural/remote services.

Total health expense reaches $24,037 million, an increase of $342 million from the 2024-25 forecast. It grows to $25,724 million by 2027-28, an average of 3.5% per year.

Acute care operating expense at $4,639 million, up $160 million from 2024-25, to support growth in service volume and costs. Acute Care Alberta will oversee hospitals, urgent care centres, chartered surgical facilities, emergency health services, and cancer care.

Assisted Living Alberta launches April 1, 2025 with a $3,848 million operating budget. If you work in continuing care, home care, or community care, this agency consolidates those services under Seniors, Community and Social Services.

New 8% income tax bracket on the first $60,000 of income saves you up to $750 in 2025. Most nurses will see this on their paycheques after July 1, 2025.

$44 million for the Physician Training Expansion Program through rural training centres. While focused on physicians, this program also aims to attract and retain health care providers more broadly in rural communities, including nurses serving alongside physicians.

Direct Financial Impact

Income tax savings: The new 8% bracket saves you up to $750 per year. If you are a nurse earning between $60,000 and $100,000, this is a guaranteed annual savings. For a two-nurse household, that is up to $1,500 combined.

Compensation: Health entity employee compensation (which includes nursing staff across all agencies) is budgeted at $10,453 million in 2025-26, up from $10,256 million in 2024-25, a 1.9% increase. However, with CPI inflation projected at 2.6%, this growth does not fully keep pace with the cost of living. Collective bargaining is underway, and the $4 billion contingency is partly earmarked for compensation pressures.

Personal Support Worker wages: If you work alongside or supervise PSWs in continuing care, federal Aging with Dignity funding of about $40 million per year supports wage enhancements for PSWs, which may help with team retention.

Rural and remote premiums: The budget includes $15 million for recruitment and retention of health care providers in underserved areas and a $12 million increase for the Rural Remote Northern Program. If you work in a rural or remote setting, these programs may benefit you directly.

Service Changes

Four new provincial health agencies: The health system is being restructured into:

• Acute Care Alberta (launched February 2025): Oversees hospitals, urgent care, surgical facilities, EMS, and cancer care.
• Primary Care Alberta (operational February 2025): Coordinates primary care teams and services.
• Recovery Alberta (operational September 2024): Handles addiction and mental health treatment.
• Assisted Living Alberta (launching April 1, 2025): Manages continuing care from home care to facility-based living.

An Integration Council will align efforts across all four agencies. For you, this means new reporting structures and potentially new leadership, but also a clearer mandate within your area of practice.

Primary Care Alberta teams: The new model puts nurse practitioners on integrated teams with family physicians and pharmacists, providing comprehensive care including after-hours, rural, and virtual services. This is an expansion of nurse practitioner scope and responsibility.

EMS investments: $60 million over three years (including $40 million in new funding) for the EMS Vehicles Capital Program to purchase and upgrade ambulances and equipment. $764 million in EMS operating expense in 2025-26.

Surgical capacity: $265 million for the Alberta Surgical Initiative to increase physical capacity through more operating rooms, renovated spaces, and new equipment. If you work in surgical nursing, this means more capacity but also higher throughput expectations.

Diagnostic imaging: $168 million in new funding to expand diagnostic capabilities province-wide.

Mental health and addiction: Two new specialized facilities will be built. Mental health classrooms expanding from 20 to 60. The Compassionate Intervention Act in spring 2025 will create a framework for mandated addiction treatment orders, requiring more recovery and secure treatment capacity.

What's Missing

No dedicated nursing recruitment strategy: Despite ongoing staffing pressures, the budget does not include a province-specific nursing recruitment or retention program. The focus is on physician recruitment (with $44 million for training expansion) without a parallel investment in nursing.

Compensation below inflation: Health entity compensation growth of 1.9% falls short of the 2.6% projected CPI inflation. Until collective bargaining concludes, nurses face a real-terms squeeze.

No nurse-to-patient ratio standards: The budget does not introduce mandatory nurse-to-patient staffing ratios, despite this being a persistent concern across acute care and continuing care settings.

Agency transition uncertainty: The reorganization into four agencies is happening while the system is already under pressure from population growth and complexity. The budget does not allocate dedicated transition funding for staff retraining or orientation to new structures.

IT system integration: $908 million is budgeted for Health information technology, but the budget does not detail how patient information systems will be unified across the four new agencies. Nurses often bear the burden of working across incompatible systems.

No overtime or workload relief: Beyond the $20 million nurse practitioner allocation and general capacity increases, there are no specific measures to address nursing overtime, burnout, or unsafe workloads.

Key Dates

Date	What Happens
January 1, 2025	New 8% tax bracket takes effect
February 2025	Primary Care Alberta becomes operational
February 2025	Acute Care Alberta launched
April 1, 2025	Assisted Living Alberta launches
After July 1, 2025	Tax savings visible on paycheques
Spring 2025	Compassionate Intervention Act introduced
2025-26	$20M nurse practitioner funding available
2025-26 to 2027-28	Health spending grows to $25.7B

Where to Get Help

Collective bargaining: Contact the United Nurses of Alberta (UNA) or your applicable union for updates on negotiations and compensation outcomes.

Rural and remote opportunities: Contact Alberta Health Services or the relevant new health agency for information about recruitment and retention programs in underserved areas.

Primary Care Alberta: For information about nurse practitioner team placements and the new primary care model, watch for announcements from Primary Care Alberta as it becomes fully operational.

Income tax: The new 8% bracket applies automatically through payroll. Contact Alberta Treasury Board and Finance at 780-427-5364 (toll-free: 310-0000 then 780-427-5364).

Budget documents: Full details at alberta.ca/budget-documents.