Mike Symon (Deakin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Late last year, on 18 November, I visited the East Ringwood Clinic, in my electorate of Deakin, to deliver an announcement of primary care infrastructure funding of $150,000 to help expand local GP services, something which the suburb particularly needs. It is the only clinic in the suburb. Even though it is very close to major hospital facilities, such as Maroondah Public Hospital and Ringwood Private Hospital, along with many other community healthcare facilities, there is quite simply no access to run-of-the-mill GP services.

When I was there I met with Dr Dilip Hoole, a director and a GP at the clinic, who showed me around the existing facilities, which are housed in a two-storey building on Railway Avenue. The building itself is very old. The clinic has actually been there for 60 years and the building preceded that by some years. It is obviously an old house that was converted many years ago. The problem of course with that is access. Many of the clinic's patients are old or infirm or have various needs to be able to get in and out of the clinic. At the moment, there are only steps, whether you go in through the front or back. In fact, the access is down a laneway. With this grant, there will not only be new rooms built to expand services but there will also be much better access for people who currently have great difficulty getting in or out of the building. Even inside the building, the clinic is spread over two floors and there are some functions that are upstairs that simply cannot be accessed by those who are not able to climb the stairs.

There is almost 100 per cent use of the consulting rooms currently at the clinic. That is good for the clinic but it obviously shows that there is a demand there. Not only will there be more room for GPs; there will also be room for a psychologist, increased mental health nurse hours and increased practice nurse hours. There will also be room for a nurse specialist for diabetes education and lifestyle coaching.

As one of 35 clinics in Victoria that are benefiting from this round of Primary Care Infrastructure Grants, East Ringwood Clinic will commence building and upgrading this year and it will be in operation in the first half of next year. That is a very good thing for an area which has an increasingly ageing population, with high health needs. It is quite often forgotten in the mainstream media that the outer suburbs do have big pockets of populations like that and do need ongoing and improved services. It is important that everyone gets access to this. There is another clinic in my electorate, that I will speak about at another time, that is also expanding to provide better local services. So it is a great outcome for the residents of East Ringwood and a good local example of the Gillard government's commitment to health in our community.