Thursday, 28 August 2025

Health system

Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (23:55): (1914) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Health. The Victorian Auditor-General’s report Planned Surgery in Victoria tabled on 13 August exposes significant failures in the Allan Labor government’s $1.5 billion COVID catch-up plan. One of the most concerning areas that was highlighted is around transparency and the reporting of elective surgery data. In the other place today the minister was asked about category 1 surgeries. The reporting has consistently said 100 per cent of cases are done well, but that was exposed through the questioning of the minister with the case presented to her. She said that is what the data shows. Clearly there is an issue. But as the Auditor-General’s report exposed, there were a number of issues, including that 34 health services are not captured in the elective surgery information system, which is ESIS. There is no complete single information source for all Victorian planned surgery activities, and that is where this data is captured and how it is reported.

Through the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee, my Liberal and Nationals colleagues have repeatedly asked the minister and the department secretary when the non-ESIS list will be included in the quarterly data published by the Victorian Agency for Health Information, or VAHI. In 2023 the then department secretary said:

Part of the planned surgery recovery reform program is to progressively make those non-ESIS lists visible …

Yet they were unable to provide a timeline. Last year the secretary said:

It is the intent of the department progressively to bring all planned surgery onto ESIS …

In 2025 the minister said:

… we are expected to commence public reporting in the 2025–26 financial year …

Well, this has been years of me asking about the issue around getting this accurate data and proper transparency in the reporting and the government has continually failed to be able to do. The action I seek is for the minister to confirm that waiting list data from these 34 non-ESIS health services will be included in the next quarterly reporting cycle to provide a more accurate and comprehensive picture of elective surgery performance across Victoria and allow for better informed decisions to address the ongoing crisis in our health system.