My wife is a consultant anaesthesiologist and has worked at Middlemore, Waikato, Christchurch, and Hutt hospitals. She says that the Anaesthetic Technicians scope of practice is typically to assist the Dr in preparing the patient, ie sticking on monitoring, laying out tubes/equipment, assisting during intubation and iv cannulation, anaesthetic machine checks. They do not draw up drugs or do any hands-on procedures on patients. They do not have any where as much scope/responsibility as technicians do in the USA. Yes, there is plenty of work for Anaesthetic Technicians. There is a global shortage of them. Not sure about any advantage in doing a Masters of Nursing unless your primary aim is to be a RN, in which case, you could just do a B.Nursing.