Tuesday, 18 June 2024

 Emma KEALY (Lowan) (14:22): My question is to the Minister for Health. A member of a regional Victorian hospital board has said that Labor’s large-scale hospital cuts will have a ‘devastating impact on the services of small regional hospitals’. Why do vulnerable and sick Victorians have to pay the price because Labor cannot manage money?

 Mary-Anne THOMAS (Macedon – Leader of the House, Minister for Health, Minister for Health Infrastructure, Minister for Ambulance Services) (14:22): I welcome the question from the member for Lowan because it gives me the opportunity to put on the record some facts in relation to healthcare funding in this state. Our last budget delivered $13 million for health care –

A member interjected.

Mary-Anne THOMAS: $13 billion, the Treasurer has corrected me – of which $8.8 billion is being expended directly in our hospitals. This includes $1.5 billion for this financial year and an additional $1.8 billion in the coming financial year. Right now my department is working with our health services, as it does every year, to negotiate their budgets – but not just their budgets, their activities and the care that they will deliver. Victorians rightly expect that when we invest almost 25 ‍per cent of the state’s budget into our hospitals this money is focused on the delivery of patient care. We make no apologies for the fact that we are now transitioning back to where we were before the COVID pandemic, when we ensured that we negotiated ahead of the financial year the funding that would be made available and the care that would be delivered in return for that funding. Let me be clear again, because it seems that the member for Lowan finds it hard to understand that when in fact you invest in a year $1.5 billion and then $1.8 billion, that is extra money, extra funding, for more care in Victoria’s public hospitals.

 Emma KEALY (Lowan) (14:24): The creation of Grampians Health, which merged four health services, led to cuts to vital programs, including cancelling the Edenhope dental service and cutting Horsham’s community rehabilitation exercise programs. Why should the community trust the minister when she states there will be no cuts or amalgamations?

 Mary-Anne THOMAS (Macedon – Leader of the House, Minister for Health, Minister for Health Infrastructure, Minister for Ambulance Services) (14:25): Once again I welcome this question from the member for Lowan because again it is an opportunity to put some facts on the table. Frankly, I am not going to take lectures from those who when they were in government closed hospitals at Eildon, Koroit, Mortlake, Murtoa, Red Cliffs, Macarthur, Clunes, Beeac, Birregurra, Lismore, Elmore –

Emma Kealy: On a point of order, Speaker, the minister’s response is not a time to attack the opposition. I ask the minister to come back to explaining how we can trust her when the first thing that she did was cancel dental services at the Edenhope hospital.

The SPEAKER: Order! Member for Lowan! I ask the minister to come back to the question that was asked.

Mary-Anne THOMAS: The voluntary merger that occurred at Grampians Health has expanded access to health care for the people of that region, including expanded maternity care, a haematology clinic in Horsham and for the first time a medical officer at Stawell, meaning that the people of Stawell can now access medical care when and where they need it.

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: The member for Euroa can leave the chamber for an hour.

Member for Euroa withdrew from chamber.