2016-04-12
Colleen Hartland - Speech in Parliament: My adjournment matter tonight is for the Minister for Health. In recent weeks the Andrews government has announced that the Williamstown Hospital emergency department faces closure, the Sandringham Hospital will be cut to daytime-only care and many other hospitals will be impacted by the dispute between the federal and state governments, with over $73 million worth of hospital funding at risk.
The state and federal governments need to sort out this funding mess as soon as possible for the community’s sake. If the Williamstown Hospital emergency department were closed, most patients would go to Footscray Hospital. The government would be well aware that the Footscray emergency department is already stretched and in massive need of redevelopment. In 2015 there were approximately 36 517 patients attending the Footscray Hospital emergency department. If the 15 914 patient presentations at Williamstown over that same time went to Footscray, there would be an increase in demand of 44 per cent at that hospital. This would take Footscray Hospital’s emergency department from busy to bedlam and would threaten the quality of care.
In 2014–15 Footscray Hospital’s emergency department was on bypass due to being over capacity for an average of 90 hours each quarter, with the worst being July–September where the hospital went on bypass for 220 hours, or 10 per cent of the time. This indicates that the department is already failing to keep up with demand. With the government’s recent elimination of bypass protocols, the emergency department at Footscray is likely to struggle even more. The community of the western suburbs can ill afford an emergency department closure.
While I do not believe that the state should be picking up the tab for the federal government, with an operating surplus of $1.2 billion in Victoria the Andrews government can afford to step into the breach temporarily until the federal government sees sense and stops point-scoring with people’s health.
When the Williamstown Hospital emergency department’s future hinges on just $5 million in funding, it would be a failure in the Andrews government’s duty of care not to fund Western Health to keep it open until the matter with the federal government is resolved. I call on the Andrews government to seek to resolve this funding dispute and to do whatever is necessary to address the funding shortfalls in the short term.