Family of murdered outback nurse Gayle Woodford implore Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to implement Gayle’s Law

THE FAMILY of murdered outback nurse Gayle Woodford has implored Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to show leadership and implement laws to protect remote health workers.

THE family of murdered outback nurse Gayle Woodford has implored Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to show leadership and implement laws to protect remote health workers.

Keith Woodford, whose wife was abducted, raped and murdered when lured from their APY Lands home in March 2016, has warned that more nurses will die unless the Federal Government makes it mandatory for outback health services to provide escorts for nurses attending night call-outs.

Speaking at length for the first time about his wife’s death, Mr Woodford said that he was frustrated by a lack of action from the Federal Government, including Health Minister Greg Hunt, despite a report recommending sweeping changes to help improve the safety of remote doctors and nurses.

Mr Woodford said he had anticipated a call from Mr Turnbull, who had told a friend he intended to phone him personally as an online petition for “Gayle’s Law” gathered momentum after the murder.

“Pick the phone up and tell me that he’s actually going to bloody do something. And actually do what you say you are going to do,” he said.

“If it’s not changed and dealt with now it will happen again.”

“The rapes are still happening, the assaults and verbal abuse are still happening, so why would you think a murder is not going to happen?”

He is still hoping to receive a call from Mr Turnbull.

Murdered outback nurse Gayle Woodford's husband Keith Woodford and son Gary Woodford. Picture: Calum Robertson

Mr Woodford was angered when a speech given by Mr Turnbull was used as a reference for Richmond AFL footballer Bachar Houli ahead of a tribunal hearing for striking a Carlton opponent in June.

“I thought ‘he is busy, he’s running the country’ but then when (his speech was used as) a reference for a footballer who bashed someone on the oval, that really pissed me off,” Mr Woodford said.

“You’ve got time to do that, but what about Gayle? What about the nurse who was murdered doing her job?”

Mr Woodford and his son Gary were in State Parliament this week as the state version of Gayle’s Law passed the Lower House unopposed.

But he and advocates such as NXT Senator Skye Kakoschke-Moore said the Federal Government controls funding for the majority of remote health providers.

While the Federal Government has issued interim funding to employ extra security, proponents of Gayle’s Law say without iron-clad legislation, laws implemented by individual states would have limited effect.

Ms Kakoschke-Moore said the SA legislation was “a great first step” but was frustrated at “buck-passing” by the Federal Government.

“I urge the government to develop these (laws) urgently and I call on the Federal Government to take the lead in responding to all of the safety and security issues faced by RANs (remote area nurses),” she said.

“Sadly, it’s not surprising to hear Keith is still waiting for a call from the PM.

“I’ve been trying to get our federal and state health minister’s to pick up the phone and talk to each other about this issue for months.”

Ms Kakoschke-Moore said the reality was that many outback nurses’ work flowed across state borders. “They should be entitled to the same rights and protections regardless of where in our country they are working,” she said.

Mr Woodford has been inundated with reports from outback nurses of continuing assaults and rapes since his wife was lured from the Fregon medical centre by convicted sex offender Dudley Davey on the eve of Easter 2016.

“If the Federal Government want these clinics to be there in Australia, they have to have security for all the health care workers up there,” he said.

“Nobody should have to go to work worried on a daily basis that they are going to get raped or bashed or killed — it would not happen down here in the mainstream — but because it’s up there it’s out of sight, out of mind and it’s just pushed under the carpet.”

Mr Woodford said nurses had feared such a tragedy well before his wife’s death.

“It should have been done years ago. Every clinical meeting the girls went to, the issue of the safety of patients coming to the homes was brought up — and nothing was ever done,” he said.

Police investigating one of the crime scenes in the APY Lands. Picture: Simon Cross

Gary Woodford said he was never comfortable with his mother working in the APY Lands and believed it was a tragedy that it took her murder to shine a light on the plight of outback health workers.

“That’s exactly what I think. They (governments) hear about it and don’t want to know about it, no one wants to step up and make the first move to protect the nurses,” he said.

“I never liked mum working up there at all, right from the start. Could you work in those conditions? I didn’t feel that they were safe.”

The Woodfords said they were touched by speeches from both sides of State Parliament this week and Keith said he hoped more states would follow SA and the NT by implementing Gayle’s Law.

“I think the more states that come on board, (it) will put the pressure on the Feds to do something, but they are just sitting on their hands at the moment as far as I am concerned,” he said.