Brumby Fails To Improve Victoria’s Drinking Water Quality

The Brumby Government has failed again to improve the quality of Victoria’s drinking water, with water suppliers detecting E.coli, aluminium and dangerous parasites in supplies between 2007 and 2008.

Shadow Minister for Health Helen Shardey said Victoria’s poor water quality was putting Victorian families at risk.

The Annual report on drinking water quality in Victoria 2007-08 released today by the Department of Human Services details 195 water quality alerts the same number of threats as the previous year.

The report found:

· Parks Victoria’s Lakeside-Candlebark Campground in the Lake Eildon National Park continues to harbour E. coli, and has done so for three out of the last four years.

· Evidence of Cryptosporidium a nasty parasite that caused the contamination of Sydney’s water supply in 1998 at Altona.

· Taste and odour issues at various locations including Emerald, Monbulk, Silvan, Dandenong and Brighton.

· E. coli cultivating at Cranbourne, Seaford, Bonbeach, Rosebud, Kooweerup, Upper Beaconsfield, Mt Eliza, Nar Nar Goon, Noble Park, Wallan, Emerald, Gembrook, Warranwood, Doncaster, Werribee South and Warburton, and a very high level reading at Monbulk in March 2008.

In January 2008 Kalorama Reservoir near Monbulk recorded E. coli readings that were worse than Melbourne’s Yarra River, Mrs Shardey said.

There is something very wrong with the Brumby Government when for two years it has failed to address recurring water quality issues.

The Brumby Government is wasting millions of taxpayer dollars to build a pipeline from drought-stricken northern Victoria which won’t have access to any water while Victorians are facing potential health issues.

With the failure of Health Minister Daniel Andrews to manage our hospitals, waiting lists and emergency wards, the last thing Victorian hospitals need is the pressure of an E. Coli outbreak in our drinking water.

The provision of pure, safe water is the most basic service taxpayers expect the government to deliver. The Brumby Government must fix the fundamentals and put the health of Victorian families first, Mrs Shardey said.

More Ambulance Delays Prompt More Excuses From Labor

An 18-minute wait for an ambulance to travel just 200 metres, or two blocks, from the Maryborough Ambulance Station to the local football oval after the collapse and subsequent death of a young footballer earlier this month is another tragic reminder of the Brumby Government’s failure to adequately staff country ambulance stations.

Shadow Health Minister Helen Shardey said the admission by Ambulance Victoria that the appalling ambulance delay was caused by a systems breakdown would add to the grief of the family of 24-year-old Carl Lawrence, who died in Maryborough on 4 April.

While John Brumby and Daniel Andrews boast about Labor’s health record, Maryborough residents and country Victorians who don’t have access to appropriate levels of care in an emergency are left to suffer, Mrs Shardey said.

It is a disgrace that the Maryborough ambulance service was unmanned because paramedics were on a fatigue break without being replaced and the Health Minister Daniel Andrews should explain why country Victorians are being denied adequate ambulance services.

Ambulance Victoria also said it was disappointed its response time was longer than what it would have been had Maryborough had coverage, and Carl’s family will never know whether a faster response time would have saved their son’s life.

A quicker response would have afforded Carl Lawrence the best possible care available, care that was denied to him because of the Brumby Government’s failure to adequately staff country ambulance stations.

Concerns have been raised for a number of years about the shortage of paramedics in Maryborough and the consequent risk to lives.

Carl Lawrence’s family is not the only Victorian family to have suffered because of a lack of adequate country ambulance services.

In January a 38-year-old Barooga woman died from complications following an ectopic pregnancy after waiting two hours for an ambulance to transfer her from Cobram District Hospital to Shepparton for emergency surgery.

John Brumby and his incompetent Minister for Health should take responsibility for the failures in Victoria’s health system which put lives at risk, Mrs Shardey said.

More Broken Promises — More Babies Missing Out

Thousands of newborn babies are missing out on vital neo-natal hearing tests despite Labor’s 2006 election promise, Shadow Minister for Health Helen Shardey said today.

In 2006 the Labor Government promised that if re-elected, it would roll out a program of neo-natal hearing testing for every newborn baby in 70 public and private hospitals across the state because early identification of hearing problems was vital in giving children the speech and language skills they need to make the most of their lives.
(Bronwyn Pike, Bendigo, October 30 2006).

Almost three years have passed and only a quarter of Victoria’s hospitals have the program the Health Minister should hang his head in shame, Mrs Shardey said.

The Brumby Government is once again failing the most vulnerable Victorians.

There is something very wrong with the Brumby Government when Bendigo where this election promise was made doesn’t even have a neo-natal hearing program. In fact all but one public country hospital has been duped on this commitment.

Four-year-old Bendigo child Jacob Floyd is one of many victims of this government’s neglect of the health system.

Born profoundly deaf, his condition was not discovered until he was 15 months old. His mother Andrea believes that if Jacob had lived in Melbourne, his condition would have been diagnosed earlier, which means he would have received therapy to help with his language skills much sooner.

Mrs Floyd said if the government had fulfilled its election promise, Jacob would have been fitted with his cochlear implant almost a year earlier and would be starting school next year, but because he missed out on promised healthcare his mum says Jacob is not nearly ready for school.

Now the government says the program will not be fully implemented until June 2011, seven months after the next state election.

How can the Premier and his embattled Health Minister expect Victorians to trust them when only 11 programs have been introduced since the 2006 announcement and 52 hospitals have missed out?

Country Victorians are sick of this government’s contempt. They deserve action, not empty promises, and the Brumby Government needs to be held accountable for its failure to deliver basic health services, Mrs Shardey said.