Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased to announce to the parliament today that from 6 March the Mount Barker District Soldiers' Memorial Hospital will begin a three-month trial of having an overnight doctor. This is fantastic news for my community. Until this time, if it was two in the morning and you had a sick child you would have to bundle your child in the car and take them on the long trip down to Adelaide. It was the biggest issue the Adelaide Hills community raised with me during the election campaign, and I extend my gratitude to the state Minister for Health, the Hon. Jack Snelling, for his willingness to negotiate on this very important issue. I have full confidence that the three-month trial will show the need for the service to be implemented permanently.

While this is great news, there remain many health issues in my electorate, some federal and some state, that need to be addressed. We need a renal dialysis service in the Adelaide Hills. As many of you know, dialysis is a commitment of three days per week. A unit would save more than 1,500 trips to Adelaide each year for residents in my community. It would also relieve the burden on major hospitals. We need a headspace in my community and access to better mental health services, particularly on Kangaroo Island. I run a youth forum every two months called Young Mayo and it is absolutely packed; there is never a chair left. These young people are currently working on a petition that they are distributing through the community to get better health services, particularly better mental health services, for our community.

Several constituents have also raised with me the lack of Medicare-rebatable MRI access in our region. Up to 20 patients a day travel to Adelaide to have a scan because they cannot afford the $300-plus cost to have a scan in Mount Barker. That is 7,300 visits per year. These are pensioners, people on Centrelink and people who are vulnerable in our community. I will continue to advocate to the federal health minister on this issue and I am hopeful that we will secure a Medicare licence for a private MRI machine to be located in the Adelaide Hills.

While today is a great news day for citizens in Mount Barker and across the Adelaide Hills, I want them to know that I will continue to fight for health services in our region, from Mount Pleasant all the way down to Victor Harbor and through Kangaroo Island. If you do not have your health, you have nothing. We deserve the same services that metro Adelaide receives.