Victoria’s hospitals will lose $17.7 billion over the next ten years, after the Abbott Government locked in savage cuts in the recent Federal Budget. This is the equivalent of 2.9 million elective surgeries or nearly 32 million dialysis sessions.
By health service, it means:
- Monash Health will lose $2.2 billion over the next ten years
- Alfred Health will lose $1.4 billion over the next ten years
- Eastern Health will lose $1.3 billion over the next ten years
- Melbourne Health will lose $1.3 billion over the next ten years
- Austin Health will lose $1.1 billion over the next ten years.
Hospitals in regional Victoria will also face significant cuts, including:
- Barwon Health, which will lose $840 million over the next ten years
- Bendigo Health, which will lose $476 million over the next ten years
- Ballarat Health, which will lose $455 million over the next ten years
- Albury Wodonga Health, which will lose $364 million over the next ten years
- Latrobe Regional Hospital, which will lose $326 million over the next ten years.
These cruel cuts are a result of the Abbott Government’s decision to abandon key components of the National Health Reform Agreement, cutting the Commonwealth's contributions and removing current funding guarantees for Victorian hospitals.
Victoria’s hospitals are already among the most efficient in the country so these cuts will have a devastating impact. They come on top of more than $1 billion cuts by the former State Liberal Government, and will result in Victorians waiting even longer for treatment in emergency departments and on elective surgery waiting lists.
On top of these cuts to Victoria’s hospitals, the Abbott Government has cut $181 million for public adult dental services, scrapped the Healthy Kids Checks for children aged 3 to 5 that give at-risk children the best start before they begin school, axed funding for programs to support young Aboriginal people access health and sexual health services and grants for people with rare conditions, and cut $90 million for Healthy Together Victoria.
The Abbott Government’s cuts to Victoria’s health system are a direct attack on our health services and on Victorian families.
Quotes attributable to Minister for Health, Jill Hennessy
“Before the last election, Mr Abbott promised he wouldn’t cut health, yet all we have seen is cut, after cut, after cut.”
“You cannot cut $17.7 billion from our hospitals and not expect waiting times to increase and waiting lists to grow.”
“The Commonwealth Government has previously agreed that it has a part to play in funding health. Tony Abbott must end the constant attempts to cost-shift and to shirk its responsibility to fund its fair share of health.”
Reviewed 19 August 2020