Wednesday, 31 July 2024

Ambulance services

Bridget VALLENCE (Evelyn) (19:09): (745) To the Minister for Ambulance Services, the action I seek is for this Labor government to end their war on ambulance paramedics by settling the protracted enterprise bargaining agreement negotiations with this vital frontline workforce. Paramedics right across Victoria do tremendous work in emergency response providing life-saving health care and should be respected and valued by the Labor government for the work that they do and provided with the certainty that they need and deserve.

Sadly the Allan Labor government has taken Victorian ambulance paramedics for granted. The minister and the government must end their protracted pay dispute and arrest the declining standards of health care and ambulance response times in my electorate and my region. As Lilydale ambulance paramedics have told me, code 1 incidents have increased, but response times are failing to meet targets and cardiac arrest survival has tragically decreased. Lest there be any doubt, the declining ambulance service in our community is through no fault of our hardworking and dedicated local paramedics, and I want to make that very clear. It is the fault of the Labor state government’s failure to properly plan, invest in and resource ambulance services for our local community and our state.

If all our local ambulances are spending hours on end ramped at Maroondah Hospital, they are not able to get out to another person having a heart attack, anaphylaxis, road trauma or any other life-threatening episode. The government has failed to address the significant and increasing pressures on Victoria’s healthcare system, the intensifying strain on Ambulance Victoria, the chaos and alleged corruption within Ambulance Victoria’s management and administrative functions and the massively, totally unacceptable ambulance ramping at hospitals. Paramedics are forced to work extraordinarily long shifts, which is unsafe and shows that this Labor government does not take seriously its duty of care for these public sector employees. Paramedics are suffering burnout. After years of training to become a paramedic, the average time in the sector is only three to five years and then many simply retire. We cannot lose this valuable workforce. Ambulance Victoria and the Allan government have failed to address the high staff attrition and have lost the confidence of the ambulance workforce.

It was a privilege recently to meet with the paramedics who live and work in our local Yarra Ranges community at the Lilydale ambulance station and to be able to thank them in person for the important work that they do in our community. I want to pay tribute to these paramedics for their courage in sharing their stories as well as providing ideas on solutions to fix some of the current challenges – in particular, Amanda, Daniel, Clare, Stephanie, Matthew and Madeleine, but also the many other paramedics that joined our meeting unexpectedly last week. These paramedics told me how ambulance ramping is entrenched and that the Labor government has lost track of the crucial role ambulance services play in our community.