Regional Victorians cannot affordto wait for an ambulance

27 August 2026

Regional Victorians cannot affordto wait for an ambulance

Nationals Member for Euroa Annabelle Cleeland has called for urgent action onambulance services in regional Victoria, after being inundated with distressingreports of delayed responses and unavailable callouts.

The comments come afterwhistleblowers told Ms Cleeland that a broken garage door at the Benallaambulance station is impacting response time targets.

Ambulance Victoria’s benchmark isto respond to 85 per cent of Code 1 emergencies within 15 minutes; the latestfigures show Benalla reaching just 58.2 per cent, Mitchell 51.6 per cent andStrathbogie only 32.7 per cent.

In Kilmore, Brian Mounsey recentlycalled an ambulance for his 92-year-old mother-in-law, Norma Walker, after shefell and suffered a head injury. There was no ambulance available, andAmbulance Victoria urged Mr Mounsey to drive Ms Walker to a metro hospital.

“These are people in my communitywho called for an ambulance because they genuinely needed one. They should notbe left wondering whether an ambulance is going to turn up,” Ms Cleeland said.

“These are not the only stories Iam hearing. Lorraine Jones, Pamela Ellis and many other regional Victorianshave had similar experiences.”

In Benalla, the ambulancestation’s garage doors are broken, meaning paramedics have to manually open andclose them every shift.

“Benalla is a town of around14,000 people. Our paramedics should not have to manually open and close brokengarage doors every time they start and finish a shift. They should be able tofocus on their job, which is looking after patients,” Ms Cleeland said.

Ms Cleeland said the problems wentwell beyond a broken garage door, and reflected a system under pressure fromtop to bottom.

“Our paramedics are doing theirabsolute best, but they cannot fix a system that is under pressure from top tobottom. People are waiting too long for ambulances, our paramedics are underenormous pressure and our stations are being left to deteriorate.

“My request to visit the Benallaambulance station was rejected in one of the most shocking politicisations ofour regional health services by this Labor government. While I am being keptout, local paramedics are getting on with the job and manually opening brokendoors every shift.”

Ms Cleeland said regionalcommunities deserved an ambulance service that worked when they needed it.

“People in regional Victoria arenot asking for special treatment. They are asking for the same basic level ofservice that Victorians in metropolitan areas expect,” she said.

“When someone calls Triple Zero inan emergency, they should be able to trust that help is coming. That is what‘every minute counts’ was supposed to mean.

“I will keep fighting for theinvestment our regional ambulance services need, for our paramedics and for thepeople in our communities who rely on them.”

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