Social services on the slide in Meander Valley

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NOVEMBER 2016 | Marguerite McNeill

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MEANDER VALLEY residents are encouraged to speak up loudly and take a stand to help retain existing Rural Primary Health Services in the Meander Valley.

Speaking out loudest is Westbury resident and volunteer Gina Linnemann who wants people in the community to understand the value of existing services provided by health workers who are unable to voice their concerns publically.

Ms Linnemann can see no sense in discarding the federally funded Meander Valley Rural Primary Health Services program that has been running very successfully for the past 12 years and introduce what she believes will be a less accommodating model in its place.

She said that funding guidelines for the new model have been altered to target people who are significantly unwell, rather than on services focussing on health promotion and illness prevention, as in the past.

The proposed changes will see existing services cease on 31st December 2016.

Three full-time health workers in the Meander Valley (a Social Worker and Mental Health Worker at the Deloraine Hospital and a Youth Health and Development Worker at the Westbury Health Centre) will lose their positions and the services they provide will cease.

There are also concerns that the changes will significantly reduce access to free and confidential counselling and support and, in turn, will compromise the health and wellbeing of the Meander Valley.

“There is nothing to replace personal interaction with one-to-one counselling and support,” said Ms Linnemann.

“It’s not easy for people to put their hand up and say ‘I need help’.”

“And it’s not easy to lay out your personal struggles to a stranger.”

“It takes time to build up a rapport and to develop confidence and trust.”

“There’s nothing to say under the new model that people will see the same social worker each time.”

“We already have the challenges of living in a rural area.  If it means travelling to Launceston for services, up to 50kms away, many people have no car or license. Working around the transport service could be too hard and they might not go.”

“There could be dire consequences.”

The changes could also see the end of many related activities such as Blokes Day Out, Meander Valley Women on the Move, Exercise Groups, Stepping Stone Camps and Nordic Walking, that all contribute to the health and wellbeing of community members and their families.

Ms Linnemann has contacted politicians and health officials from Hobart to Canberra and is frustrated by the mostly fragile response to the concerns she is voicing on behalf of the entire Meander Valley community.  She is now encouraging others to join in the fight and add their names to a petition “Federal Heath Minister: Save the Meander Valley Rural Primary Health Services Program.”

Visit www.change.org/p/ f e d e ra l - h e a l t h - m i n i s ter-save-the-meander-valley- rural-primary-health-services- program.

The petition will be forwarded to the Federal Minister for Health, Sussan Ley and to State Health Minister Michael Ferguson.

Copies of addresses for the various contacts that you can write to and a letter template are also available at Seppenfelts in Deloraine and the Meander Valley Council offices in Westbury.

[udesign_icon_font name="fa fa-camera" color="#000000"] Mike Moores