David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to put voice to the 97,909 people in the MidCoast Council area, mainly the 48,000 people in the Manning Valley and similar numbers in Forster-Tuncurry and Gloucester region, who are being short-changed by the New South Wales government and the Hunter New England Health authority, in particular. The late Stephen Bromhead, member of the Legislative Assembly for the Myall Lakes, achieved so much for the hospital. He got a commitment of $160 million in total for the upgrade of the Manning Base Hospital, which has suffered from being stuck inside the vortex of the Hunter New England Health authority.

Why is a federal member speaking about state responsibility issues? You may well ask that. The reason is—I want to be on the public record saying this—the Hunter New England Health authority has sucked the life out of many country regional hospitals in its area. It's a massive area going up to Tenterfield, Glen Innes, Inverell—it is a big area. The best way for John Hunter Hospital and Maitland Hospital to cope with the whole population of Newcastle is for them to have strong regional hospitals so that not everyone gets referred down to Newcastle. There was a commitment to do a major renovation and an upgrade of the Manning Base Hospital. They've done the first stage, but back in 2021 there was a $100 million on the table. The government has changed, but the thing that remains in common, from the money that was there in the previous state government's budget to now, is the Hunter New England Health authority.

We've argued many times. Many people have signed petitions. Over 12,000 people in the Manning Valley have written on a petition calling on the government to spend the money that has been there since 2021. Nothing has happened. They come out with a master plan, or they come up with a clinical services plan. I spent 33 years working in New South Wales public health. I know how the beast works. Bureaucrats can obfuscate, they can divert, they can do stalling measures, they can say other priorities have popped up—I'm telling you there are 100,000 people in Forster-Tuncurry and in the Manning Valley who are missing out because this Newcastle-centric area health authority thinks that anyone else should just be delegated to a new ambulance station or a superficial upgrade.

I fought tooth-and-nail from the federal level to make sure that the Manning Base Hospital got an MRI licence when they were limited. We delivered that. I fought to get a headspace which was federally funded into Taree and the Manning region, as well as outreach to Forster-Tuncurry. We have delivered $4½ million for a radiotherapy unit in the Manning Valley, based in Taree. But it has been held up for 18 months or more through council disapproval and then finally for regional planning approval. But the thing that really needs to be done is the Manning Base Hospital upgrade. It needs to start its upgrade now. There's $100 million on the table.

Also, Stephen Bromhead and the now member for Myall Lakes, Tanya Thompson, fought tooth-and-nail to get a commitment for a public hospital in Forster. That's 48,000 people who don't have a public hospital. It's outrageous that an area that swells to probably 90,000 people during vacations does not have a public hospital. The general practitioners in a major surgery working out of a nearby private hospital have a couple of renal beds and rehab beds, but it deserves its own hospital, and I call on Hunter New England Health to take off their blinkers, look at the needs of 100,000 people and start that planning now for a Forster public hospital and for the upgrade, the money for which they've copped and are spending elsewhere, probably in Newcastle.