Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The electorate of Gorton does not have a Medicare office. The population explosion in the west of Melbourne has not been matched with an increase in appropriate Commonwealth public services. Medicare is a basic health service and yet there is not one Medicare office in the entire electorate. With the single notable exception of the funding of the Deer Park bypass after a concerted community campaign, the federal government has neglected the needs of Melbourne’s expanding western corridor. Areas of my electorate, in particular suburbs like Deer Park and St Albans, have a disproportionate number of elderly residents. These elderly residents remember a time, not that long ago, when they did have access to a Medicare office in their own community at Deer Park. However, that office has been closed.

The ideal location for such an office would be the rapidly expanding Watergardens Town Centre, which is quickly becoming the major shopping and transport hub for the outer western suburbs. It is also the centre for one of the fastest-growing corridors anywhere in Australia. Until the government announces plans for a Medicare office in my electorate, voters in the electorate will rightly see the absence of such a basic health facility in their community as a sign of the lack of regard the federal government has for their needs. I hereby table a petition of 3,831 petitioners demanding the government locate such an office in the electorate of Gorton.

The petition read as follows—

To the Honourable Speaker and Members of the House of Representatives assembled in Parliament:

This petition of certain citizens of Australia draws to the attention of the House the failure of the federal Government to establish a Medicare office in the federal electorate of Gordon.

Recognising the rapid expansion in population in the western Melbourne corridor and the associated need for federal government services, your petitioners call on the House to support the establishment of a Medicare office in the federal electorate of Gordon.

from 3,831 citizens.