Shadow Minister for Health Helen Shardey said it was shameful that less than a year after merging Victoria’s rural and metropolitan ambulance network Labor will scrap Ambulance Victoria’s first aid training services.

An alert recently posted on the Ambulance Victoria website reads: Ambulance Victoria First Aid will soon be withdrawing from providing First Aid training. Public courses will be conducted up to the end of April 2009. No more bookings will be taken for onsite First Aid training.

Mrs Shardey said it was outrageous that first aid training for Anaphylaxis Management (treatment for anaphylactic shock) was one of the programs that would no longer be available from Ambulance Victoria’s service, particularly when the Brumby Government made such training mandatory in schools.

The website also notes that the First Aid Training and Qualifications division of Ambulance Victoria employs 12 full-time staff and more than 100 part time instructors.

These instructors conduct courses specifically tailored to save lives in workplaces and at home, Mrs Shardey said.

The division is managed from Ballarat and training is conducted at outlets including Bairnsdale, Ballarat, Bendigo, Colac, Geelong, Hamilton, Mildura, Sale, Swan Hill, Traralgon West, Warrnambool, Wangaratta and Wodonga.

How many more programs can the Brumby Government cut from rural and regional health services? Mrs Shardey said.

Not only has this Labor Government made it more difficult for vulnerable Victorians to access hospital care through lack of hospital beds and closure of maternity services, now it is limiting rural and regional access to first aid training, Mrs Shardey said.

Outside metropolitan Melbourne someone’s first aid training can often be the difference between life and death for a workmate or family member in an emergency.

The Brumby Government should be boosting health services, not scrapping first aid training programs that provide local jobs and save lives, Mrs Shardey said.