Griffith LHAC focused on several priority areas this year, channeling our energies towards aged care, mental health, Aboriginal health, domestic violence, and the hospital redevelopment. We hosted an Advance Care Planning forum in August at the Griffith City Library, with topics including guardianship, advanced care plans and directives, trustee and guardianship.

We learned more about mental health areas that address youth, suicide prevention, age related, depression, and positive stories thanks to guest speakers. We also became better educated about the challenges being faced by the mental health team in Griffith.

Our LHAC is saddened at the disturbing statistics for domestic violence within the Murrumbidgee and we applaud the work done by the MLHD to address domestic violence issues, whilst recognising there is still more to be done. We have committed to supporting events like the Stop Domestic Violence rally, as well as advocating for locals who are experiencing domestic violence.

Guest speakers also provided an overview of Aboriginal Health Services available in the hospital, Community Health and emphasised the importance of building strong foundations, positive changes, and initiatives such as the Aboriginal Midwifery Service. I led young Aboriginal boys from Wade and Griffith high schools on a tour of the hospital and its new renal unit, an employment and training initiative but also an opportunity to highlight the chronic diseases affecting the Aboriginal community such as obesity and kidney disease.

Members attended LHAC forums in Tumbarumba and Wagga and I’m delighted to announce Griffith will host the May LHAC forum in 2019. This will be a fantastic opportunity for us to showcase to other LHACs what our wonderful city has to offer.

Griffith LHAC will also fully support stage one of the hospital redevelopment works in 2019 and proudly be one of the voices for our community when it comes to the works addressing the priority areas of oncology, ambulatory care, HITH and ICU expansion along with ward improvements. It is my privilege to be re-elected as chairwoman and join committee members Yvonne Turnell, Peter Sparks, Kim Burgess, Karen Snaidero, Val Woodland, Lucinda Gidlow, and Saideh Barlow, in serving our community in 2019.

In the final days of 2018 there was some fascinating reading in a range of newspapers. We were told by prominent Queensland physicist Peter Ridd that extensive studies show Barrier Reef coral bleaching is not going to kill the reef.

There were more articles about the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, which is increasingly being exposed as a political con with insufficient scientific modelling, which is now coming at great expense to taxpayers and rural communities.

And we had revelations that despite what the animal welfare lobby groups tell us, the average Australian continues to eat eggs and that their push against the egg industry has exposed this group as not being representative of the average Australian.

During 2019 we must spend more time questioning the scientific and inner-city elite communities who are trying to force their social engineering on the rest of the population, though never at their expense.

Many of their ideologies are based on false premise, yet the political power they pull has unfairly and unnecessarily affected the livelihoods of many hard-working Australians.

Let’s work to swing the pendulum back towards common-sense, for the sake of our nation and those who have helped make it great.