Labor launches Victorian election campaign with $1.38b health pledge

Labor’s re-election campaign for 2018 has been launched with over $1 billion worth of promises aimed at Victorians’ health, the sector that helped the party sweep to power four years ago when paramedics and nurses campaigned for them en masse.

Federal Opposition Leader Bill Shorten (left) applauds as Victorian Premier Dan Andrews arrives to the Victorian Labor Party's official state election campaign launch event at Monash UniversityCredit: AAP

In a $1.38 billion pledge, Labor promised on Sunday to employ an additional 1100 nurses and midwives, employ 90 more paramedics and buy 23 new ambulances, build or expand 10 new community hospitals and fund 500,000 extra specialist medical appointments.

Before a crowd of hundreds of Labor faithful inside Alexander Theatre at Monash University, Premier Daniel Andrews promised to raise nurse-to-patient ratios in public hospitals and boost regional care so fewer sick people have to travel to inner Melbourne for specialist treatment.

Mr Andrews said the promised boost to specialist care in the regions would mean 75,000 extra appointments for heart conditions, 30,000 for arthritis care, 50,000 for people with chronic pain and 40,000 for cancer sufferers.

“That’s half a million chances at hope,” Mr Andrews said.

The promise to employ 1100 more nurses and midwives is expected to cost about $460 million, and would roster an extra nurse on night shift at every public hospital in Victoria, Mr Andrews said.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews greets former premier Steve Bracks Credit: AAP

With Victorians due to vote in 27 days, the theme of the launch was “delivering for all Victorians”, and there were multiple references to a government having delivered on each of its many promises.

Over a safe Oz-rock soundtrack that culminated with Jimmy Barnes' tune No Second Prize, the Premier listed several initiatives under Labor's rule in the last four years, including 70 new schools, piloting a medically supervised injecting room, legalising assisted dying, extending rail to Mernda and starting work on the West Gate Tunnel.

“Across our city and across our state there are cranes in the sky and shovels in the ground,” Mr Andrews said. “There are boots in the mud and boom gates in the bin.”

The message to voters was one of trust: we've done what we said we would four years ago, and if you re-elect us for another four years we will do more of the same.

Federal leader Bill Shorten lauded the Victorian government for passing Australia's first Aboriginal treaty legislation and for beginning planning on the suburban rail loop, a project he said was "the holy grail" of public transport links in Melbourne, which governments had spoken about "for 120 years".

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews, his children Grace, Joseph, Noah, and wife Catherine are seen on stage during the Victorian Labor Party's official state election campaign launch. Credit: AAP

Mr Shorten also mocked the state Liberal slogan, Get Back in Control, with its message that Labor has lost control of crime, congestion and the cost of living.

“Were they trying to send a message to their mates in Canberra?” Mr Shorten said.

Deputy Premier James Merlino raised the spectre of Liberal cuts to government services, a theme of the previous Baillieu government that he sought to link to the Opposition under Matthew Guy.

"I don't want to waste words on our opposition today but I will say this: fairness has never been their agenda," Mr Merlino said.

"And when it comes to our breakfast clubs, our support to cover the cost of camps, excursions and uniforms, they've already promised a so-called audit, and we know what that really means."

There was even time for a revealing anecdote from Cath Andrews, the premier's wife, about getting stuck at the Centre Road level crossing boom gates in Melbourne's south-east while being driven to hospital to give birth to their third child.

Recent polls have put Labor ahead by roughly the same margin by which they won in 2014, 52 per cent to 48 per cent of the two-party preferred vote.