Helen Kroger (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to raise serious concerns faced by many in Australia and, I suggest, all Victorians. We know that the Australian public has wised up to a couple of things about the Labor government. One is that its answer to every public policy challenge seems to be to throw money at it. It cannot control its spending. The other is the shameless way the government demonstrates no accountability in keeping the promises and pledges it makes. To be quite frank, I am sick of it, Victorians are sick of it and, I have to say, all Australians are over it. In the last three years alone we have heard constant spin and rhetoric from both frontbenchers and backbenchers in the government who have engaged in most impressive theatrics here in the Senate about the government's so-called ironclad commitment to a budget surplus in 2012-13. We all know, of course, what happened to that promise: another pledge junked in that bottomless pit of policy pledges that must exist in the Prime Minister's office. We know we cannot believe a word they say about the budget and the state of Australia's finances because there is a history here that has existed since this Gillard government was elected.

You do not have to do speak to many outside the corridors of Parliament House to appreciate the extent to which this government's economic credibility has been shredded. As a consequence, the government is desperately seeking measures across many portfolios to plug the financial black hole. I have put on the public record many times, here and in Senate estimates, my disgust at the way the government has slashed the defence budget, just to take one portfolio as an example. While the ADF are under increased pressure to do a lot more, particularly in protecting our borders, and we know they have done an amazing job in assisting with disaster relief this year alone, they are doing this with a budget that has essentially been slashed by a third. The long-term implications for our military and our national defence, versus the short-term expediency approach of this Gillard government, are an absolute disgrace.

But in the few minutes I have in this adjournment debate I wish to turn to my home state of Victoria, where cuts to the federal budget are not just theoretically hurting families but effectively depriving them of essential services in their immediate communities. The Gillard government's decision to cut funding to public health services, to the tune of $107 million, has severely impacted the Victorian health system. The biggest impacts have been felt across Eastern Health and Southern Health services in areas such as Lilydale, Maroondah, Box Hill, Monash, Moorabbin, Casey, Dandenong, Wantirna, Blackburn, Clayton and Burwood East, where my electorate office resides. More than $8.4 million was cut from one hospital, the Maroondah Hospital, alone and as a result beds have been closed and elective surgeries have been postponed. State-wide vital services have been withdrawn and staff numbers have been slashed. This is an absolute disgrace that we should not allow the government to get away with.

It is a great disappointment that there is no Victorian Labor senator sitting here tonight, a Thursday night—clearly, they are on the plane home—because they should be ashamed of what has happened in Victoria and the consequences of the slashing of the health budget. Senator Collins, a colleague in this place, has an electorate office in Box Hill, not far from mine. Just under 10,000 residents live in Box Hill, many of whom will note the damage that health funding cuts have done to their local hospital. More to the point, many of them have picked up the phone and called to my office to say, 'Can you do something about this because we're not getting a response from her office?' In 2010-11, Box Hill residents had to wait 46 days longer than the national average for elective general surgery. This is no fault of the Victorian Liberal government, notwithstanding what we have heard in the defence and rhetoric from the federal government. The Victorian Liberal government, since its election in 2010, has increased funding for Eastern Health services by almost $10 million. The residents of Box Hill have been severely let down by people like Senator Collins and the member for Chisholm, Ms Anna Burke.

I have been very proud to work side by side with our Liberal candidate for Chisholm, Mr John Nguyen, who is talking to many in the Chisholm community about the things that are affecting them and how this budget cut is really hurting their families. His electorate office in Mount Waverley has been inundated, like mine, with calls about this very issue. Southern Health's services have been severely impacted by the cuts and they have been forced to close a 28-bed ward in the Monash Medical Centre in Clayton. Eastern Health's services have been devastated so badly by the funding crisis that they have closed a Blackburn-based mental health program. They have actually slashed the program because they can no longer afford to sustain and support it and they do not know if and when they will be able to resume this vital service for the area.

It is a deep tragedy that public services on which so many Victorians rely have been cut in such a detrimental way. The same situation exists in Deakin, where the member is Mike Symon. We have a great candidate there in Michael Sukkar. Like me, he has been hearing the same thing in Deakin. There is a consistent message across the south-eastern corridor on the outskirts of Melbourne, and that is that these health cuts are really impacting on families and hurting their children. It is a disgrace. Yet what have we heard from the member for Deakin, Mike Symon? I have looked in the papers and, I hate to say, I do not think there has been a peep from him about it.

More than $8.4 million has been taken out of Maroondah Hospital's budget, as I said. As well as facing cuts, Maroondah Hospital and Box Hill Hospital are having to pick up the pieces from other hospital closures, so those two hospitals are impacted by more people going to them because of the closures of other services in the region.

Non-urgent pathology tests are being sent to these hospitals for processing, but this in turn compromises the safety of patients. It takes time for transportation to the pathology labs, for diagnosis and for treatment. It is actually extending the whole time process. When we are talking about essentially life-and-death issues in many cases, it is something that I think is unacceptable. Not only have the cuts been extraordinary in the electorates of Chisholm and Deakin but across the state of Victoria I have been advised that there have been some 350 bed closures. So the question remains: yes, through political pressure the government did put back in some of what they took out, which was $108 million back into the system, but there is no guarantee of what is going to happen after 30 June 2013. There has been no indication of how this is going to be addressed from 1 July on. What programs will still have to be cut? The hospitals and the health service providers are still in no-man's-land as to how they are going to run their health budgets. It is a crisis that continues in Victoria. It is one that demands immediate attention, and I urge the government to address it.