By Aaron Cordy
VICTORIANS may be left without a sickbed after opposition leader John Pesutto accused the State Government of slashing millions in funding to regional and rural health services last week. Sparking fears of hospital and health service amalgamations, service cuts and possible hospital closures.
It’s claimed that the Allan Government is forcing unrealistic savings targets on all 76 of Victoria’s health services. This comes in the wake of the government’s round of trojan announcements of increased funding to rural health services including $10.2M to build a new three-storey apartment block to accommodate visiting medical staff and new employees of GV Health, and Kyabram District Health Service received a $4.5 million grant it had received as part of the Regional Health Infrastructure Fund to upgrade the existing operating theatre and procedure room.
The shadow minister for Health, Georgie Crozier met with Liberal MP Wendy Lovell and Nationals MP Kim O’Keeffe at GV Health last week to discuss broader workforce shortages and issues impacting GV Health.
“The upcoming budget as we’ve been told by the treasurer it’s going to be a horror budget. It’s going to be a shocking budget for all Victorians. And what we know is that cuts to regional and rural health services are going to have devastating impacts on working communities,” said Ms Crozier.
Liberal MP Wendy Lovell has been championing the course of improving local health services knowing how undermanaged local health systems are and the devastating effect cuts will have on healthcare in the region.
“We’re very concerned about these cuts to health services. I was up in the Northeast yesterday, and there’s communities there that are desperately scared they are going to lose their health services,” said Ms Lovell.
“What we have here is a state Labor Government that can’t manage money and are willing to play Russian roulette with the health of rural and regional families in order to prop up the budget line in Melbourne.”
The Victorian Minister for Health Mary-Anne Thomas told ABC radio the report was at best misleading and at worst simply wrong. But when pressed she wouldn’t deny that the Government has asked rural and regional health services to make cuts.
“There will be no hospital closures under my watch,” said Ms Thomas, after she blamed COIVD and the Federal government for the state of the Victorian health crisis.
The state is in mass debt, which will become undeniably clear when the budget comes down. What that means for sick and unwell people in the region is anyone’s guess. For the staff at GV Health who are already stretched thin, it means the support they desperately need will not come anytime soon.
“At GV Health, we see the challenges facing our sector every day, and we understand the importance of working constructively to secure health services for regional Victorians into the future,” said a GV Health spokesperson.
