Liberal Party Victoria
A new report from the Victorian Auditor-General reveals Labor's COVID Catch-up Plan for planned surgery has fallen well short of what the government promised to deliver.
A snapshot of the Victorian Auditor-General's latest report:
- Failure to meet surgery targets: Labor's $1.5 billion COVID Catch-up Plan promised 240,000 planned surgeries in 2023-24 but delivered just 209,925.
- Botched private hospital partnership: Labor's plan to use private hospitals to cut the backlog delivered just 31,209 extra surgeries instead of the promised 51,200.
- Delays in timely care: The plan aimed for 95 per cent of patients to be treated within clinically recommended timeframes but failed to meet this target.
- Underperformance of new surgical centres: Frankston's new public surgical centre performed just 6053 procedures in its first full year, well short of its 9000 target. Blackburn's surgical centre missed its target of 5760, only delivering 1519 surgeries.
- Lack of transparency: The government fails to provide full transparency on the true number of patients on waiting lists for surgery at all Victorian public health services. This means that the surgery waitlist is likely much higher than 58,627.
Shadow Minister for Health, Georgie Crozier, said: "Labor promised to clear the backlog, but instead thousands of Victorians are still waiting too long for the health care they need.
"This is a damning report that exposes not just a failure of Labor to deliver, but also a deliberate refusal to be transparent about the true state of our surgery waiting lists.
"Victorians deserve a government that puts patients first, not more political spin."
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