Wednesday, 4 March 2026

 Rachel PAYNE (South-Eastern Metropolitan) incorporated the following (2387):

My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Health, and the action I seek is for the Minister to advise what is being done to ensure that Victoria’s health system has a culture that takes mandatory reporting obligations seriously.

This week we celebrate International Women’s Day.

The theme ‘balance the scales’ is a promise that every woman and girl, regardless of background of identity, should be safe, heard, and free to shape their own lives. Unfortunately, we still face barriers to fulfilling this promise, while discriminatory laws, policies and practices persist.

In women’s healthcare, this government has taken meaningful steps to recognise and respond to how these barriers prevent safe access.

Australia’s first ever inquiry into Women’s Pain shone a light onto what many of us have already known.

We are left to suffer with pain for far too long because our healthcare needs are dismissed, disrespected or we receive inadequate treatment, leading to distrust in the system.

Part of the call for change coming out of this inquiry was that women want to be treated with empathy and respect and empowered to make informed decisions about their health.

Disturbing allegations about surgical misconduct at a Melbourne private hospital have again shone a light on the difficulties in answering this call.

Reports are that a surgeon removed tissue and organs from young women for “severe” endometriosis when pathology showed they had little or no trace of the disease – leaving some in pain and with compromised fertility.

Women should feel confident about their treatment. These allegations dismantle this confidence.

It is particularly concerning that despite mandatory reporting obligations reports suggest it took three years since the first complaints to hospital management for them to notify AHPRA and that concerned nurses were told to write to the hospital’s legal department if they wanted support from the hospital.

These reports are incredibly distressing – it should not have taken so long for these concerns to be escalated.

I have endometriosis, many of my dear friends have endometriosis. You suffer from so much pain and the least you deserve is a medical system that you can trust.

So, I ask, will the Minister advise what is being done to ensure that Victoria’s health system has a culture that takes mandatory reporting obligations seriously?