Adjournment speech
Victorian Ambulance Union says digital problems mean Ambulance Victoria shifts are regularly unfilled
February 8, 2022
Tania MAXWELL (Northern Victoria) (21:07): (1707)
My adjournment is to the Minister for Ambulance Services (Hon. Martin Foley MP), and it is regarding the ever-deepening crisis facing our ambulance services. The action I seek is for the minister to provide an update on the enterprise resource planning project to manage rostering for ambulance services.
We recognise that COVID-19 has placed enormous strains on our health system, and I think there is an inherent learning from the pandemic that we must bolster our health services for the long term to ensure we can meet the challenges of the future. In this digital age, our government agencies, particularly those relating to critical service delivery, should be leading the way in how they utilise technology.
The Victorian Ambulance Union secretary was recently reported as saying that problems with an IT system result in ambulance shifts regularly going unfilled. With staffing issues a recurrent challenge for Ambulance Victoria, system issues should be supporting and not hindering efforts to ensure that every shift is adequately staffed.
The enterprise resource planning project was due to start in 2019, and the planned delivery end date is June this year. The Ambulance Victoria strategic plan progress report of June 2021 had this project marked as being on track, yet the government’s digital strategy and transformation website indicates that the $10 million project seems to be stalled and is undergoing an internal review. There was no mention of the project in Ambulance Victoria’s most recent annual report.
In the last year 700 additional paramedics have been recruited. If we have an extra 700 paramedics on the books, I think the general public and our paramedics, who are working so incredibly hard, deserve an explanation of how rostering systems have such regular gaps, why the development of an IT system that would be intended to make rostering easier has been delayed and when it will get back on track.
