Ms JENNY AITCHISON (Maitland—Minister for Regional Transport and Roads) (21:08): I update the House and my community on health and mental health in Maitland. First, a good announcement was made today. Community consultation has opened for a new mental health facility in Maitland, with a focus on rehabilitation and forensic mental health services. Currently those services are offered at Morisset, but they will be relocated to the Maitland campus at the new Maitland Hospital. A community consultation day will be held on 21 August between 10.00 a.m. and 2.00 p.m. and between 3.00 p.m. and 5.00 p.m. People can also submit written submissions until 30 August. Plans for the facility are on my social media page, and I have already received community feedback about parking. Unfortunately, the images did show parking, but there will be more parking because we know that is an issue. Most importantly for the patients, it will be holistic and focused on rehabilitation. There will be three inpatient areas, which will have living facilities and indoor and outdoor therapy spaces. The site will have a completely new building.

I want to be clear about this because the community needs to know what is going on. My commitment to our community is to always be open about what is happening with our physical health and mental health services. We know that this is a critical need in Maitland. In fact, we still have some mental health services being provided from the old hospital site, which is why it is not quite vacant. That has had us in limbo. Paediatric and adult services are operating from that site now. This may provide the opportunity for them to move into that building. We are working on the other building too to consolidate the community services being operated from the old Maitland Hospital site. They include the sexual assault service, palliative care, the mental health facilities and some others—I think it is the Family Care Cottage. We are looking at how we can do that. When those buildings are complete, we can turn our attention to the site of the old Maitland Hospital.

I want to update the community. I have been meeting with Minister Park and his staff, and just today I met with his staff and the staff of the local health district. We talked about some of the concerns raised with me. We know that the former Government left that hospital in a terrible state. It was a brand-new hospital, opened with much fanfare in February 2022, and it then had the highest emergency department walkout rate in the State. People were presenting and then walking away because they could not get treatment. There has been a significant increase in staffing, but it is not enough because there are a lot of challenges. We heard Minister Park talking in question time yesterday about the real concerns we have. More staff members are on the way. We are training more and putting more on. We are recruiting and trying to work on the workload so that they can get the ratios they have been fighting for, and they are coming. We are trying hard.

The other thing about the hospital is that we recently saw the opening of the short-stay centre. It is not open seven days per week because we have a staffing issue, but it is open on four days. In the last half of the fourth day, because it closes, they try not to put patients in there, but that provides care for people who might need to spend between one and 24 hours in an emergency department. It is like a halfway admission. They get access to meals and things you do not get in the emergency department. It is for somebody who needs observation. It also has some good facilities for children who might be in need of isolation for protection or for contagious patients who need to be kept away from the general patients.

There is a lot of work happening here. I reassure the community because I know we are coming into local election time and many people want to make a noise about things. I want my community to know that I continue to advocate for that hospital. We waged a seven-year campaign with the community, the unions and Labor, backing our health workers and our community—less than one in five of whom has private health insurance—to have a fully public hospital. We won the fight. I will continue to advocate to have more health services delivered on that site, more staffing and shorter waiting time for all patients.

Ms KATE WASHINGTON (Port Stephens—Minister for Families and Communities, and Minister for Disability Inclusion) (21:13): I thank the member for Maitland for her contribution tonight and remind her community of her incredible advocacy on its behalf to ensure that it has the health services it needs. She has prevented the hospital from becoming a private venture under the former Government and has ensured that the hospital now has the staff to deliver the health services her community needs. There could not be a stronger, louder voice for her community than the member for Maitland. I really thank her for what she has delivered for her community, which also services the Port Stephens community that I represent. I thank the member for Maitland for her incredibly strong advocacy over so many years to ensure that her community has the health services it needs and deserves.