If the pundits are right, covid-era health services are in for a rough ride in the state budget on 7 May.
HealthShare Victoria’s staff are about to find out if they have a job beyond the upcoming Victorian Budget on 7 May.
According to Nine Newspapers, employees of the shared care provider were called to an all-staff meeting on Thursday to be told the repercussions for them of what is described as a horror state budget, due on 7 May.
“[We] have not been provided any information about the purpose of these meetings other than the CEO alluding to budgetary pressures and that cuts have been made across the sector, and we are no different,” one employee told the media.
Another said: “A reorganisation is being announced to meet budget savings. Jobs are under threat.”
According to its last annual report, HealthShare Victoria had 276 full-time staff as at June 2023. Speculation is that as many as 16 full-time positions will be axed.
Meanwhile, the state’s peak health consumer organisation, the Health Issues Centre, shut up shop in March after funding cuts cost it seven jobs.
As reported by HSD earlier this month, state health minister Mary-Anne Thomas denied that regional hospitals would close “on her watch” following speculation in the Herald Sun that mooted mergers of hospital services across the state would inevitably lead to closures.
At the time a Victorian government spokesperson told HSD that there were “no plans to close any Victorian hospitals”.
“We have a world-class health system in Victoria – it continues to be our largest investment and this will continue to be the case.”
The next day, Ms Thomas admitted that “health service delivery across Victoria was being examined”.
Mental health professionals told The Australian today that the state government had refused to deny “budget cuts to services catering to conditions including alcohol and drug dependency, eating disorders and borderline personality disorder”.
Victoria’s debt level has hit $115 billion this financial year and is projected to reach $178 billion by 2026-27. Last year’s state budget called for public service workforce savings of $544 million in 2024-25 alone.
Speculation is that health services that were created or received boosted funding during the covid pandemic will be the ones to suffer most.
“The difficulty is that we’re not seeing a decline in presentations, and at the same time we’re being told this is going to be a really tough budget and it’s likely we’ll lose that funding,” one mental health worker told The Australian.
“They’re just telling us that we’ll find out on May 7. But normally by now we have an indication of funding arrangements. The effect is that 50% of our workforce will go if they don’t continue the uplifted funding.”