Tuesday, 8 September 2026

 Wendy LOVELL (Northern Victoria) (23:55): (2781) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Health, and the action that I seek is for the minister to commit additional funding to expand services at Albury Wodonga Health beyond the existing redevelopment plan. Last Friday I met with a group of energetic residents from Albury–Wodonga who call themselves the Concerned Nannas. They are concerned about Albury Wodonga Health and do not believe that the current redevelopment will provide the facilities necessary to handle patient demand in a health catchment that services 300,000 people. The current service is incapable of coping with demand, and they shared stories of cancelled surgeries, delayed care, long waiting lists, crumbling facilities and constant ambulance ramping. But they argued that the proposed redevelopment and its seven-storey medical tower will struggle to meet even existing demand, let alone demand in 10 years time. The strain on the health service is also causing significant stress among doctors and nurses. Morale is at rock bottom. Many good doctors have left, and recruiting new doctors is a struggle.

The Nannas managed to gather a remarkable 12,800 signatures on a statement that calls on the New South Wales and Victorian state governments to work collaboratively with each other and with local and federal governments to deliver the best possible health service for the region. The statement calls for a pause on the existing redevelopment and asks for a new single-site hospital. It also calls for modular wards to immediately address the current bed shortage that sees the health service between 30 and 70 beds short of what is needed on a daily basis. The volume of signatures demonstrates the level of concern in the Albury–Wodonga community: 12,800 people from both sides of the border signed the statement, and it should not matter which state the signatures come from because Albury–‍Wodonga is one community with a cross-border health service that is managed by Victoria, so every signature matters.

The concerns of the signatories are not new. I have raised them countless times with this Labor government, which continues to stonewall and dismiss every criticism. I attended the Albury–‍Wodonga regional health summit in 2024 and heard that the new plan on the table was designed to fit a limited budget, not to meet need or demand. Since then, even that plan has been gutted. There is no helipad, the paediatric ward is a ghost floor, an operating theatre a shell and a multistorey car park has been dumped too. I successfully moved a motion in this Parliament requiring this government to produce documents that reveal how the Victorian Labor government and New South Wales cooked up this half-baked plan, but the government never complied with the order. I spent two years fighting for transparency, and this government keeps ignoring it.