Health services to the Hunter Region of NSW are being compromised by dangerously short staffing levels – with 106 vital positions currently advertised as vacant on the NSW Health website, Shadow Minister for Health Dr Andrew McDonald has warned.

 

The unfilled positions include registered nurses, midwives, physiotherapists, occupational therapists psychiatrists, surgeons and sexual assault health workers.

 

"Health services in the Hunter have become dangerously short-staffed under the O'Farrell Government," Dr McDonald said today.

 

"The fact that 106 positions were unfilled as of 1pm today is truly shocking – and points to a mounting crisis in health services in the Hunter.

 

"While the hospital corridors and parking lots are clogging up with patients, there are not enough staff to see them and care is being compromised.

 

"The frightening thing is that these are just the 106 vacancies we know about.

 

"The Minister has ordered a recruiting go-slow and many others positions are being left permanently unfulfilled. The 15,000 job cuts announced in the Budget will only wreak further havoc.

"The Hunter is always being forgotten.

 

"This month's State Budget contained no extra funding to boost beds or staff capacity in the emergency ward at John Hunter, Calvary Mater and Maitland Hospitals.

 

"Instead, all this Government has delivered is staff shortages. It's left healthcare services in the Hunter basically running on fumes."

 

Deputy Opposition Leader and Shadow Minister for the Hunter Linda Burney said: "After 15 months of Barry O'Farrell administering the hospital budget for the Hunter, resources are failing to keep up with population growth.

 

"It is the O'Farrell Government which has capped the wage rises of nurses and other medical staff in our public hospitals at 2.5 percent – well below the rate of inflation.

 

"Last week, the Government rammed through sweeping cuts to workers' compensation. A nurse at John Hunter who has to pacify an ice addict or crashes while driving home from night-shift has now had their entitlement decimated.

 

"Thanks to the O'Farrell Government, the recruiting environment for healthcare professionals in the Hunter has never been worse.

 

"This is a crisis of the Premier's own creation – and Mr O'Farrell needs to explain how he will direct our locally-trained healthcare professionals to the Hunter where patients are growing more desperate every day."