Page 2017 - Week 06 - Tuesday, 5 June 2018
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We will hire the equivalent of 66 more teachers and support staff to meet growing school enrolments, and we will recruit a further 15 school psychologists—fully delivering on our election commitment to make mental health services more accessible for kids through their schools.
We are also investing in more support for students with disability and those who have complex health needs to ensure local schools can offer them the same learning opportunities as other Canberra kids.
Like our schools, Canberra’s hospital and health services need to keep growing to make sure all Canberrans can access quality care when they need it.
The number of people presenting to local emergency departments has grown by about 40 people a day since 2015, while at the moment elective surgery waiting lists are growing faster than our hospitals can reduce them.
Canberra’s doctors, nurses, midwives and allied health staff are working incredibly hard to keep up with this growth. This Budget will back them up with a significant new investment in front-line staff and services.
We are funding 4,000 more elective surgeries over the next four years, raising ACT Health’s annual target to around 14,000 surgeries a year.
We are growing funding for emergency surgery and the Emergency Department at The Canberra Hospital, to cut wait times and ensure more patients get the care they need sooner.
We are delivering on our election commitment to upgrade critical parts of our public hospitals, including an expansion of the Calvary Public Hospital Emergency Department.
And we are funding more hospital beds across the Territory including more maternity places and more beds to cope with the annual winter surge that hits The Canberra Hospital during flu season.
We are making these investments in hospital beds and staff now while we continue to invest in new health infrastructure for the future. This includes progressing the development of SPIRE and developing new Northside hospital options.
Importantly, we are also investing in other front-line health services to help take the pressure off our hospitals. This Budget delivers a significant expansion of the Hospital in the Home program—with 30 nurses and six doctors added to the service so that an additional 3,000 patients a year can receive the care they need in their own homes and community health centres.
With the Government’s investment in the new University of Canberra Hospital also coming online this year to provide rehabilitation and sub-acute health care, we are ensuring more tertiary hospital beds are available for those who need the most intensive and specialised care.
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