By Ann Marie Angebrandt
THE Hoppers Crossing ambulance station will revert to a 12-hour station after three months as a 24-hour facility despite recent data showing Wyndham had among the worst performance rates in Melbourne.
Metropolitan Ambulance Service (MAS) data showed the Werribee station had 19 cases of Code One emergencies where an ambulance did not respond for 20 minutes or more in the year to December 2005.
The Hoppers Crossing station had 14 cases.
James Howe, an MAS spokesman, said the Hoppers Crossing station, which was upgraded to a 24-hour facility in March 2006, will return to a 12-hour station on 17 July.
The number of paramedics working at the station will fall from eight to four, he said.
“The money we found to upgrade the station was only meant to be until the end of the financial year after we found extra money in our budget,” he said.
He pointed out the cases of 20-minute-or-longer waits in Wyndham represented only a small percentage of the 2000 calls a year taken last year at the Werribee station and about 1000 at Hoppers Crossing.
Mr Howe estimated it would cost about $500,000 a year to keep the Hoppers Crossing facility running as a full-time station.
Steve McGhei, assistant secretary of Ambulance Employees Australia, said the temporary funding for Hoppers Crossing was an “obvious recognition of the increased need for more services in the area”.
“This is quite a busy area, and there will be even fewer resources to cater for the growing case load once Hoppers goes back to 12 hours,” he said.
Wyndham mayor Shane Bourke said the council was concerned about the ambulance performance level and wondered what would happen as Wyndham’s population expanded.
“This is a serious concern because lives are at stake,” he said.
Mr Howe said both the Werribee and Hoppers Crossing stations had met State Government targets since 2004 requiring an average response time of between 11 and 12 minutes in 90 per cent of cases.
The State Government has announced it will improve ambulance services in Melbourne’s outer suburbs as part of this week’s budget.
