Albury-Wodonga: Albury hospital redevelopment to start next year

Albury and Wodonga have split on the push for a new greenfield hospital with fears the southern border city will be the big loser.

A campaign to deliver a $1 billion new hospital in Albury-Wodonga is on life support, with the cross-border health service in charge justifying a cheaper option to rebuild the existing Albury hospital.

Albury-Wodonga Health’s total catchment area of 300,000 people includes rural areas on both sides of the border and the community and medical professionals were pushing for a state-of-the-art new hospital on a greenfield site.

Services are presently split between Albury and Wodonga hospitals and funded by the Victorian and NSW governments.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet announced joint funding of $558 million for a rebuild of the Albury hospital last year. NCA NewsWire / Simon Dallinger

Last year, the two state Premiers, Daniel Andrews and Dominic Perrottet, announced their governments would put $558 million on the table for a rebuild of the Albury site.

At the AWH annual meeting on Tuesday, chairman Matt Burke resisted calls for the board to resign following a backflip on its support for the greenfield option.

He promised work would start on the Albury rebuild next year and be completed by 2027-28.

Opponents were also urged to swing support behind the project rather than advocate for an unfunded alternative that could take years longer to happen.

“Our vision has always been for a single site hospital, consolidating acute and subacute services on a single site,” Mr Burke said.

“While greenfield was our preferred option, brownfield was always a viable option as well.

“To have successfully secured $558 million in government funding to achieve that is a cause, in my view, for celebration, not consternation.”

The Albury hospital site. NCA NewsWire / Simon Dallinger

NSW Health Infrastructure will be in charge of the project with Mr Burke pointing out other regional centres including Wagga, Shepparton, Lismore, Bendigo and Warrnambool had successfully redeveloped existing hospitals.

Albury and Wodonga councils were unified in its support for a new hospital until Albury backed away on Monday night.

A deeply disappointing @AlburyCity meeting tonight where the council heard from Mayor Kylie King that there was "insufficient evidence to justify advocacy for a greenfield site given specific details of the proposed Albury Hospital Campus redevelopment are yet to be released". pic.twitter.com/R0vWc8BxFX

— Better Border Health (@BBorderhealth) February 27, 2023

Mr Burke also defended the failure to release planning documents that guided the decision to choose the rebuild option.

“It is important to know the master plan as it’s been called was a preliminary site study that has since been superseded and will continue to change over the next six to nine months,” he said.

“It wasn’t a blueprint for a building, but it identified the size, scale and infrastructure required for a future hospital.”

Member for Benambra Bill Tilley.

Benambra MP Bill Tilley said Wodonga would be the big loser with the Albury rebuild option.

“We went to the annual meeting to hear the justification for ignoring the need to build a new hospital on a greenfield site and instead we got a cry for help,” he said.

“What we heard was a health system at breaking point.

“They start every day at minus 35 beds, 35 patients already over capacity, they prop up the staff with 100 imported health workers in motels every night.

“The project on the table, that they want us to unite behind is a partial fix and is at best five years away, 2028.

“They have no idea what they are going to do with Wodonga hospital.”

Mr Tilley was joined by Victorian Shadow Health Minister Georgie Crozier at the AWH annual meeting.