Page 2819 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 14 August 2018
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the delivery of acute and emergency care. And this boost is focused on meeting the needs of our growing community and our ageing population and building a health system that puts patients at the centre of all the services that are delivered.
I am pleased to say that this year’s budget provides a significant new investment of $112 million in staff and services to enhance our core hospital community health services over the next four years. This investment is designed to meet the growing demand for hospital services and give greater flexibility for ACT Health to put more resources into emergency and critical care, more surgeries and more hospital beds. It will significantly improve the ability of both the Canberra and Calvary hospitals to manage patient demand and patient flow for emergency departments and surgical areas.
For the Canberra Hospital this funding represents a significant boost in the funding for essential emergency and critical care services, including the following new initiatives: $64.7 million to increase the number of elective and emergency surgeries, $25.9 million to resource more hospital beds and $21.2 million for more resources to help cut waiting times at the Canberra Hospital emergency department.
In addition, this budget also invests in programs aimed at reducing pressure from front-line hospital services. This includes $34.5 million being invested to expand the popular hospital in the home program so that around 3,000 patients each year can receive the care they need in their homes or in community health centres, to more quickly return to their lives and improve their recovery. This initiative delivers on an election commitment and is an initiative that builds on last year’s budget to see this expansion come to fruition.
As minister I am also focused on ensuring we have high quality health infrastructure across the city to meet the needs of our growing community. As part of this I am very pleased to say we are now treating the first patients at the new University of Canberra Hospital, which officially opened in June this year. The opening of the new hospital has been a very exciting time for the local health sector and a major milestone for ACT Health which has been the culmination of years of planning and a lot of hard work.
I am also pleased to say that next month we will officially open the new Gungahlin walk-in centre, correlated with the Gungahlin community health centre in the Gungahlin town centre. Once open, it will be Canberra’s third walk-in centre, extending the services that consumers highly regard at Belconnen and Tuggeranong to the expanding and newer suburbs in the north of Canberra.
But when it comes to how the government is continuing these long-term investments in the health facilities our city will need in the years ahead, the budget also includes $2 million to continue the planning and delivery of Canberra’s fourth walk-in centre, located in the Weston Creek region, and $12 million to construct a new health centre for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Canberrans through staged payments to Winnunga Nimmityjah Aboriginal Health and Community Services so that they can own and operate their own expanded health centre.
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