The Andrews Labor Government’s cutting-edge new ambulance branch in Dandenong is a step closer, with construction getting underway.

Member for Dandenong Gabrielle Williams today turned the first sod for the new 24-hour branch to be built on Stud Road in Dandenong.

The spacious new branch will feature a five-bay garage for vehicles and modern facilities for paramedics including four rest and recline rooms, a kitchen, training room and staff car parking spaces.
It will make a big difference for Dandenong paramedics currently operating from the CFA building on the Princes Highway and give locals the peace of mind that when a medical emergency strikes, help is just around the corner.

The Labor Government has invested a record $1 billion to deliver more paramedics, more vehicles and more stations. This includes a big $299 million boost in the Victorian Budget 2019/20.

Ambulances managed the largest ever number of emergency cases for the July to September quarter, with 78,130 Code 1 call-outs across Victoria – up from 69,753 a year earlier.

Despite dealing with an extra 8300 extra callouts, our dedicated paramedics are arriving within the benchmark of 15 minutes for 83.3 per cent of Code 1 calls – up from 71.8 per cent at the height of the ambulance crisis when the Liberals went to war with paramedics and response times blew out to the worst on the mainland.

In the City of Greater Dandenong, we are seeing even more improvement, with 91.5 per cent of ambulances now arriving within 15 minutes for Code One emergencies, up from 84.7 per cent in 2014/15.

The average time for an ambulance to reach the scene of a Code One emergency in the City of Greater Dandenong over the same period has improved from 11:21 minutes to 9:45 minutes.