RAYMOND TERRACE HEALTHONE CLINIC

23-November-2010

Mr CRAIG BAUMANN (Port Stephens) [12.30 p.m.]: I move:

(1) Notes more than two years have passed since the Government promised a HealthOne clinic for Raymond Terrace.

(2) Notes that Port Stephens Council is prepared to proceed with the project, but is waiting on the Government to allocate funding.

(3) Calls on the Government to fast track this development to ensure much needed health services are brought to Raymond Terrace.

It never ceases to amaze me as I check the Legislative Assembly Business Paper for the coming sitting week that notices of motion I moved 12 months prior continue to be relevant. Every week I look at the Business Paper and there is a motion I moved 365 days prior calling on the Government to do this or that in Port Stephens. Almost without fail, the motion will still be relevant because this incompetent Government has not done this and is utterly incapable of doing that. This week the relevant motion relates to the HealthOne Clinic in Raymond Terrace, which was promised a good three years ago. Has a sod been turned? No. Has a development application been submitted? No.

To correct the year-old motion, we have now suffered three-and-a-half years and five Health Ministers since the HealthOne clinic in Raymond Terrace was announced and the project is as good as a piece of paper gathering dust on a shelf. By the Government's own admission, the HealthOne clinic is needed in Raymond Terrace given the demographics of the community. Raymond Terrace, with a population of approximately 12,500, is one of the largest communities in the Port Stephens local government area and 34 per cent of residents of the Port Stephens local government area are aged under 24 years and 14.8 per cent are aged 65 years or older. Raymond Terrace also has the largest Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population in the Port Stephens local government area, accounting for 35.5 per cent of the local government area's total Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population.

The Raymond Terrace population includes high levels of social and economic disadvantage. Single-parent families make up 20 per cent of the population compared with the State average of 16 per cent, and 27 per cent of the population reports living on less than $250 per week. In 2006, 8.9 per cent of the population was unemployed compared with the 5.9 per cent State average. Most people are employed in retail, manufacturing, healthcare and social assistance. Since the project was announced, more than $100,000 has been allocated here and there for planning for the project. The original plan related to a site in the Raymond Terrace central business district at the major intersection of William and Sturgeon streets. In March last year the Minister advised in answer to a question on notice:

In 2008-09, $100,000 was allocated from the HealthOne NSW budget to Hunter New England Area Health Service to support the planning for HealthOne Raymond Terrace. The planning for the HealthOne NSW service in Raymond Terrace has begun. The development of integrated clinical models of care with GPs and community health services has commenced and will continue in parallel with the planning and construction of the HealthOne Raymond Terrace facility.

The Raymond Terrace community waited and waited for action on this project. I know that Port Stephens Council was ready to go, but the State Government would not release the funds. So the community waited and waited. By December last year, nothing had changed. The answer to a question on notice at that time confirmed that:

The general site for the HealthOne development has been selected. It is a part of a large parcel of land owned by Port Stephens Council within the Raymond Terrace CBD.

Then, earlier this year, and after I gave notice of this motion, it came to my attention that NSW Health was eyeing off a location slightly out of the central business district—a vacant lot adjacent to the local bowling club that had been the site of a swimming pool but which the council has zoned residential. The council even planned a medium-density unit development on that site and obtained all necessary planning approvals so that the eventual purchaser would have no doubt as to council's and the community's intentions for the sensitive site. I put more questions to the Minister. Without any warning, without any consultation and, of course, without any apology, the Minister replied in April that:

There have been significant changes and progress in regards to this project an alternative proposal was developed for construction of the HealthOne facilities under the ownership of New South Wales Health. Funds of $1.3M were provided for site acquisition and contracts exchanged for an appropriate site in Raymond Terrace in March 2010. This will provide certainty for the HealthOne project going forward but, as would be expected, this will incur some delay to completion of the project.

So the farce began. Port Stephens residents have seen it all before. We have had a decade of promises to build a new police station in Raymond Terrace; we have had a decade of promises to widen Nelson Bay Road between Anna Bay and Bob's Farm; we have had $7.7 million spent on glossy brochures telling us that the Government would build an extension of the F3 to Raymond Terrace; and we have had the three years of chopping and changing promises to build a new ambulance station in Nelson Bay.

The HealthOne clinic is now not expected to come online until mid 2012. The problem is that we need this clinic desperately. It is always the same story when this State Labor Government breaks a promise to the people of Port Stephens. If there was a need for this project when it was announced, why has the Government now decided there is no need for it? It is just like the former Prime Minister and his campaign about climate change, which he dubbed the greatest moral challenge of our time. He suddenly decided that great moral challenge could wait until after an election because it was not popular. It is an inherent trait of Labor to say and do anything to win an election and then to deal with the problems later—or should I say, wash their hands of the issue later?

Demand for general practitioners is so great in Raymond Terrace and surrounds that clinics such as Raymond Terrace Family Practice are struggling to cope. Raymond Terrace is not just about the local community. Surrounding areas like Medowie and the Tilligerry Peninsula also rely on Raymond Terrace for health services. The Tilligerry does not have a general practitioner and Medowie has two practices. Given that the population of Medowie alone is 8,000, that represents 4,000 people per general practitioner. There are also no bulk-billing doctors anywhere in Raymond Terrace, which concerns a number of my constituents. The State Labor Government's neglect of healthcare in Port Stephens extends beyond Raymond Terrace—namely, to the Tomaree Community Hospital, which I have mentioned in this place on numerous occasions. That hospital spends about one-quarter of its $4 million annual budget transferring patients for treatment. The hospital does not even have an X-ray machine. The State Government has banned local general practitioners from visiting their patients in the hospital. The State Government has just plonked—

Dr Andrew McDonald: Point of order: I refer to Standing Order 76, relevance. The member is meant to be talking about Raymond Terrace. He can mention Tomaree Community Hospital in passing, but he is continuing to discuss it rather than Raymond Terrace.

ACTING-SPEAKER (Mr Wayne Merton): Order! I will give the member the benefit of the doubt. The member for Macquarie Fields' comment is fairly made, but we will wait and see.

Mr CRAIG BAUMANN: I referred to Tomaree Community Hospital because the State Government has just plonked a $1.3 million general practitioner clinic on its grounds despite the Federal Government recently opening a super clinic in Nelson Bay and three well-manned clinics already servicing the Tomaree Peninsula. The HealthOne facility, when it eventually opens, will be run by the existing Raymond Terrace Family Practice. Its premises are just a few doors down from my electorate office and I know for a fact that the operators are desperately keen to move out of their cramped building. That is why, as my motion suggests, the State Labor Government must look to fast-track this development to meet the growing health needs of the Port Stephens community. This Government's Federal counterparts obviously saw the need. That is why, probably out of frustration, they committed to build a super clinic in Raymond Terrace at the last election. We will not hold our breath for that project either. If this Government cares at all about the health and wellbeing of the people of the Hunter, Port Stephens and Raymond Terrace, it will support this motion. If not, I will take great pleasure in informing my constituents of the extent of Labor's neglect of our wonderful region.