Friday, 14 August 2026

 Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (12:39): (1427) My question is to the Minister for Health. Minister, regional Victorians are waiting longer to be seen in emergency departments, with stays of 24 hours or longer increasing. In July a man presented to Ballarat Base Hospital by ambulance. He was clearly unwell and required oxygen. He was left seated in the ED waiting room, where he had a cardiac arrest and tragically died in another hospital. Doctors are saying the unsustainable levels of pressure on staff are the new normal, and it is affecting patient safety and highlights the catastrophic issues facing regional hospitals. How did the government allow the system to deteriorate to such an extent that conditions are now described by doctors as being dysfunctional and dangerous?

 Ingrid STITT (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health, Minister for Ambulance Services, Special Minister of State) (12:40): I thank Ms Crozier for her question. I want to, at the outset, just offer my deepest condolences to that particular person’s loved ones. I am not in a position to be able to comment further on that incident, given that there are established processes that need to be undertaken in these circumstances. But my deepest condolences go to that particular individual’s family and loved ones. It must be a very difficult time.

As I have indicated in the house already this week, our government will continue to support our frontline health workers, including in our busy emergency departments. Like many other jurisdictions across the country, we know that our emergency departments have never seen demand and numbers of presentations like this ever before. That is why our government is continuing to invest, for example, in a number of regional hospitals, upgrading the facilities and building new emergency departments, including at the Ballarat Base Hospital. In addition to that, we are also investing in important initiatives that help –

Members interjecting.

The PRESIDENT: Order! It is too noisy. Ms Crozier, please.

Ingrid STITT: We are making important investments in alternative care pathways so that emergency departments can be for life-threatening emergencies, as is appropriate. We have a virtual emergency department, which is seeing significant numbers of Victorians and taking the burden off our frontline hospitals and EDs. Of course we have also got other important services, such as Nurse-on-Call, and we are looking at the program of urgent care centres that we have rolled out across both metropolitan and regional Victoria to take pressure off our busy emergency departments. We will continue to invest – over $32 billion in this year’s budget alone – to back our frontline workers in the incredibly challenging work they do each and every day. I want to thank them. I will continue to listen to the workforce and our emergency department professionals, because there is always more that we can be doing to support patients and the flow through our busy hospital system.

 Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (12:43): What an extraordinary answer. ‘Dysfunctional and dangerous’ – that is what the frontline workers are saying. Minister, you have failed to release the latest VAHI data for the second quarter of this year, but the first quarter showed that of the 3300 patients who stayed in an ED for at least 24 hours, 70 per cent were in regional and rural Victoria. The length of extended stays has been increasing for years. Why are Victorians being put at risk and, sadly, even dying whilst waiting for care?

 Ingrid STITT (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health, Minister for Ambulance Services, Special Minister of State) (12:43): There are a number of assertions contained in that supplementary question, including assertions around the government providing information and being transparent about the performance of our health services, something that I note never once came out of anyone opposite when they were in government. I have already addressed these issues in the chamber this week around some of the reasons why there are long stays in our emergency departments. It includes things like more complexity and acuity of people presenting, particularly older people and people waiting for aged-care beds and NDIS packages, which is what we are doing – working closely with the Commonwealth and other jurisdictions around getting bed block out of our emergency departments and bed flow through for the people who need it most. We will continue to focus on that work, not on the cheap political shots.

 Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (12:44): I move:

That the minister’s responses be taken into consideration on the next day of meeting.

Motion agreed to.