If successful, a new Western Riverina Local Health District would be formed, and would see the southern Riverina region break away from Murrumbidgee Local Health District.
The new health district is being promoted by Member for Murray Helen Dalton through a Health Services Amendment (Splitting of the Murrumbidgee Local Health District) Bill 2025.
A Legislative Assembly Committee on Community Services report was tabled last week, recommending the parliamentary vote.
Mrs Dalton said the report “puts it in black and white, the current system is not working for the people of Murray, and the people making the decisions have never set foot in most of our hospitals”.
There has been particularly strong support for the Bill in Griffith, and Berrigan Shire Mayor Julia Cornwell McKean said the report puts the “shire’s urgent health needs firmly in the spotlight”.
She said while the report’s only recommendation is for parliament to consider the bill, it does highlight “serious service gaps affecting local communities”.
It notes the absence of an ambulance station in Tocumwal, the need for faster access to life-saving stroke care, and the importance of improving cooperation between NSW and Victorian health services.
Mrs Dalton said the report records that a Griffith City Council survey of 791 residents found 62.3 per cent want the district split while only 2.8 per cent support the current structure and that the doctors of the Griffith Base Hospital Medical Staff Council were unanimous in wanting Griffith to break away.
The current Murrumbidgee Local Health District is based in Wagga, and Mrs Dalton said while it is “a fine city … it is not where my constituents live, and it should not be where every decision about their health gets made”.
She said one council told the inquiry the district’s engagement with the community improved since the noise of the split, “which shows exactly how much notice they take when country people stay quiet”.
“We need our own Western Riverina Local Health District run by people who live here, and now every politician in the Parliament has to decide whether they will listen to the people who sent them there,” Mrs Dalton said.
When Cr Cornwell McKean gave evidence at the associated inquiry, she expressed concern that health care in Berrigan Shire is in crisis.
She said the report is a clear opportunity for the NSW Government to move beyond acknowledgment and deliver practical change.
“We are not asking for miracles - we are asking for equity,” she said.
“People in Berrigan Shire deserve the same chance of timely, appropriate health care as people in the cities and other parts of the district.
“A person’s life expectancy should not depend on where they live, or on a bureaucracy that forgets we are also its responsibility.”
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