'Wake up call': more Aussie kids missing milestones
Nearly half of all Australian children are not meeting physical, emotional, social and communication developmental milestones by the time they start school, as calls for a universal early education system intensify.
Only 53 per cent of children are developmentally on track when they start school, a slight decrease since 2021, according to the Australian Early Development Census.
The national survey of 288,483 children and 16,723 teachers measured development across five domains: physical health and wellbeing, social competence, emotional maturity, language skills and communication.
The rate of children developmentally vulnerable in two or more domains is at its highest level since the census began in 2009, sitting at 12.5 per cent.
Only 43 per cent of children in remote Australia were developmentally on track, compared to 50 per cent in larger regional areas and 54 per cent in the major cities.
Those rates represented a slight decline for all children since the last census in 2021.
There were also developmental gaps among First Nations students and children from lower-income families.
The results demonstrated the urgency for equitable early education and health services, according to several advocacy groups.
Children's health charity Royal Far West, which links rural families with specialist support, has long been highlighting the shortage of early intervention services in the bush.
There were nearly 200,000 children in remote areas with very limited access to speech and language therapy or mental health support, with 37 psychologists per 100,000 people in outer regional areas.
The federal government must live up to its promise to even the playing field, the charity's chief executive Jacqui Emery said.
"(The) government must ensure that every Australian child, regardless of their location or circumstances, is not left behind," Ms Emery said.
"The 2024 census underscores how urgent and important these reforms are for all Australian children."
There have been several steps towards universal access, with the government introducing a three-day guarantee for early childhood education, abolishing the activity test and committing to build more services in areas of need.
Minderoo Foundation's Thrive By Five campaign, which highlights the importance of learning and brain development in a child's early years, called for more comprehensive reforms including tailored services for First Nations children.
"This data should be a wake-up call, but it should also be a call to action," spokesman Griffin Longley said.
"We know what works and we know how to fix this; now we need to build the system that gives every Australian child the foundation they deserve."
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The Advertiser
2 hours ago
- The Advertiser
Too many of us are not as lucky as me. And that's extremely risky
My GP bulk bills me. My status has been grandmothered. It's a bloody miracle and I'm grateful. I'd personally like to thank former prime minister Gough Whitlam. Medibank, the forerunner to Medicare, was his brainchild. It began in July 1975. But after the Whitlam government was dismissed, the Fraser government buggered it up. Levies on incomes unless you were privately insured. Nine years later, former prime minister Bob Hawke (the National Museum of Australia calls him Robert. Way too formal) established Medicare. He said: "With this historic initiative, all Australians now have a new, simpler and fairer health insurance system." Well, kind of. Stephen Duckett, the absolute full-bottle on Medicare over decades, tells me that bulk-billing is crucial. We had a peak five years ago and it's been downhill from there. "There are good grounds not to have out-of-pocket payments for GPs. And right now, it's a lottery," he says. Duckett's right. When you front up at your GP, you don't automatically know whether you will be in the lucky group to be bulk billed. "You might be asking when you front up," he says. But it's the uncertainty, the possible embarrassment of signing up to pay money you don't have. He commends any government's attempt to get practices to be 100 per cent bulk-billing because then patients get 100 per cent certainty. And getting that 100 per cent certainty about your healthcare matters. Too many of us are not that lucky. News this week that Canberrans are now paying out an average of just over $62 in out-of-pocket fees to see their GPs is unnerving. If you don't have the sixty-odd bucks, you don't go. And that's extremely risky. British research shows us (and Australian research backs it up) that continuity of care is associated with higher life expectancy. If you don't get that care, you die. Well, we all die - but without regular contact with a regular GP, you have a shorter life expectancy. Good access, lower cost, the necessary number of GPs per head of population - these are all associated with longer lives. The cost of visiting the GP is putting many of us off from getting essential health care. Late last year, the ABS reported a rise in the number of people who reported not visiting the GP because of cost-of-living pressures. In the financial year ending June 22, 3.5 per cent of people either put off or didn't see a GP when they needed to because of the cost. Three years later, that number had risen to 8.8 per cent. In February, the gentle warming-up period of the election before everyone got stroppy and out of control, Labor pledged $8.5 billion for Medicare, so all of us would have access to bulk billing by 2030. The plan, according to Labor, would produce patient savings of up to $859 million a year by 2030. It's Medicare's 41st birthday and this investment, if the bulk billing strategy works, is a huge birthday gift to those of us who benefit from universal health care. That is, all of us. In 1984, the annual GP bulk-billing rate was 51 per cent. It hit a 40-year high of 94 per cent in April 2020, under a Coalition government. Of course, some of that was due to special COVID items. Don't want to go back there if COVID is what it takes. But what can we do to make sure our GPs are protected too? They need to be properly remunerated for what is often grinding work with long hours. Good thing I never ended up as a GP. Imagine having to be patient with patients for hours at a time. Having to be kind to the miserable. Just doing that with your own kids is quite enough, let alone with anyone else's. Now we also have to get to work on specialist fees. I've written elsewhere about the insanity of those fees. This week, the Grattan Institute revealed more than one in five Australians who saw a specialist in 2023 was charged an extreme fee at least once. It also said one in 10 Australians who saw a psychiatrist ended up paying $400 in out-of-pocket costs for their initial consultation alone. It also had a list of recommendations. My vengeful self enjoyed some of those, such as stripping Medicare rebates from specialists charging excessive fees, more than others. And I love the idea of the Medical Cost Finder website, designed so people can compare out-of-pocket fees doctors charge for specialist procedures. But last year it was revealed that five years after the site launched, just 20 doctors out of the 36,000 specialists nationwide provided their fees for listing. MORE JENNA PRICE: There are some useful bits, though. For example, your first specialist appointment will see you pay just under $200, and on average, $117 out of pocket. The rest is paid by Medicare. That's across the country. The most expensive is the ACT where the typical specialist fee is $285. Patients will find themselves two hundred bucks out of pocket. I am not entirely sure how the government will sort this out but we urgently need an overhaul of what we pay for our health. Jim Chalmers is talking tax reform and maybe we need some kind of a sliding scale for people whose super balances are above $3 million, more than he's proposing right now. Universities have a part to play too. Maybe they should let more students into medical schools. Maybe free tuition but then bond students to rural and regional areas for 10 years? Are specialist colleges acting in the best interests of Australians? Or in their own financial best interest? I dunno. But whatever we are doing isn't working. May the government's plans work - and once GPs are sorted, let's start working on the rest of the health industry. My GP bulk bills me. My status has been grandmothered. It's a bloody miracle and I'm grateful. I'd personally like to thank former prime minister Gough Whitlam. Medibank, the forerunner to Medicare, was his brainchild. It began in July 1975. But after the Whitlam government was dismissed, the Fraser government buggered it up. Levies on incomes unless you were privately insured. Nine years later, former prime minister Bob Hawke (the National Museum of Australia calls him Robert. Way too formal) established Medicare. He said: "With this historic initiative, all Australians now have a new, simpler and fairer health insurance system." Well, kind of. Stephen Duckett, the absolute full-bottle on Medicare over decades, tells me that bulk-billing is crucial. We had a peak five years ago and it's been downhill from there. "There are good grounds not to have out-of-pocket payments for GPs. And right now, it's a lottery," he says. Duckett's right. When you front up at your GP, you don't automatically know whether you will be in the lucky group to be bulk billed. "You might be asking when you front up," he says. But it's the uncertainty, the possible embarrassment of signing up to pay money you don't have. He commends any government's attempt to get practices to be 100 per cent bulk-billing because then patients get 100 per cent certainty. And getting that 100 per cent certainty about your healthcare matters. Too many of us are not that lucky. News this week that Canberrans are now paying out an average of just over $62 in out-of-pocket fees to see their GPs is unnerving. If you don't have the sixty-odd bucks, you don't go. And that's extremely risky. British research shows us (and Australian research backs it up) that continuity of care is associated with higher life expectancy. If you don't get that care, you die. Well, we all die - but without regular contact with a regular GP, you have a shorter life expectancy. Good access, lower cost, the necessary number of GPs per head of population - these are all associated with longer lives. The cost of visiting the GP is putting many of us off from getting essential health care. Late last year, the ABS reported a rise in the number of people who reported not visiting the GP because of cost-of-living pressures. In the financial year ending June 22, 3.5 per cent of people either put off or didn't see a GP when they needed to because of the cost. Three years later, that number had risen to 8.8 per cent. In February, the gentle warming-up period of the election before everyone got stroppy and out of control, Labor pledged $8.5 billion for Medicare, so all of us would have access to bulk billing by 2030. The plan, according to Labor, would produce patient savings of up to $859 million a year by 2030. It's Medicare's 41st birthday and this investment, if the bulk billing strategy works, is a huge birthday gift to those of us who benefit from universal health care. That is, all of us. In 1984, the annual GP bulk-billing rate was 51 per cent. It hit a 40-year high of 94 per cent in April 2020, under a Coalition government. Of course, some of that was due to special COVID items. Don't want to go back there if COVID is what it takes. But what can we do to make sure our GPs are protected too? They need to be properly remunerated for what is often grinding work with long hours. Good thing I never ended up as a GP. Imagine having to be patient with patients for hours at a time. Having to be kind to the miserable. Just doing that with your own kids is quite enough, let alone with anyone else's. Now we also have to get to work on specialist fees. I've written elsewhere about the insanity of those fees. This week, the Grattan Institute revealed more than one in five Australians who saw a specialist in 2023 was charged an extreme fee at least once. It also said one in 10 Australians who saw a psychiatrist ended up paying $400 in out-of-pocket costs for their initial consultation alone. It also had a list of recommendations. My vengeful self enjoyed some of those, such as stripping Medicare rebates from specialists charging excessive fees, more than others. And I love the idea of the Medical Cost Finder website, designed so people can compare out-of-pocket fees doctors charge for specialist procedures. But last year it was revealed that five years after the site launched, just 20 doctors out of the 36,000 specialists nationwide provided their fees for listing. MORE JENNA PRICE: There are some useful bits, though. For example, your first specialist appointment will see you pay just under $200, and on average, $117 out of pocket. The rest is paid by Medicare. That's across the country. The most expensive is the ACT where the typical specialist fee is $285. Patients will find themselves two hundred bucks out of pocket. I am not entirely sure how the government will sort this out but we urgently need an overhaul of what we pay for our health. Jim Chalmers is talking tax reform and maybe we need some kind of a sliding scale for people whose super balances are above $3 million, more than he's proposing right now. Universities have a part to play too. Maybe they should let more students into medical schools. Maybe free tuition but then bond students to rural and regional areas for 10 years? Are specialist colleges acting in the best interests of Australians? Or in their own financial best interest? I dunno. But whatever we are doing isn't working. May the government's plans work - and once GPs are sorted, let's start working on the rest of the health industry. My GP bulk bills me. My status has been grandmothered. It's a bloody miracle and I'm grateful. I'd personally like to thank former prime minister Gough Whitlam. Medibank, the forerunner to Medicare, was his brainchild. It began in July 1975. But after the Whitlam government was dismissed, the Fraser government buggered it up. Levies on incomes unless you were privately insured. Nine years later, former prime minister Bob Hawke (the National Museum of Australia calls him Robert. Way too formal) established Medicare. He said: "With this historic initiative, all Australians now have a new, simpler and fairer health insurance system." Well, kind of. Stephen Duckett, the absolute full-bottle on Medicare over decades, tells me that bulk-billing is crucial. We had a peak five years ago and it's been downhill from there. "There are good grounds not to have out-of-pocket payments for GPs. And right now, it's a lottery," he says. Duckett's right. When you front up at your GP, you don't automatically know whether you will be in the lucky group to be bulk billed. "You might be asking when you front up," he says. But it's the uncertainty, the possible embarrassment of signing up to pay money you don't have. He commends any government's attempt to get practices to be 100 per cent bulk-billing because then patients get 100 per cent certainty. And getting that 100 per cent certainty about your healthcare matters. Too many of us are not that lucky. News this week that Canberrans are now paying out an average of just over $62 in out-of-pocket fees to see their GPs is unnerving. If you don't have the sixty-odd bucks, you don't go. And that's extremely risky. British research shows us (and Australian research backs it up) that continuity of care is associated with higher life expectancy. If you don't get that care, you die. Well, we all die - but without regular contact with a regular GP, you have a shorter life expectancy. Good access, lower cost, the necessary number of GPs per head of population - these are all associated with longer lives. The cost of visiting the GP is putting many of us off from getting essential health care. Late last year, the ABS reported a rise in the number of people who reported not visiting the GP because of cost-of-living pressures. In the financial year ending June 22, 3.5 per cent of people either put off or didn't see a GP when they needed to because of the cost. Three years later, that number had risen to 8.8 per cent. In February, the gentle warming-up period of the election before everyone got stroppy and out of control, Labor pledged $8.5 billion for Medicare, so all of us would have access to bulk billing by 2030. The plan, according to Labor, would produce patient savings of up to $859 million a year by 2030. It's Medicare's 41st birthday and this investment, if the bulk billing strategy works, is a huge birthday gift to those of us who benefit from universal health care. That is, all of us. In 1984, the annual GP bulk-billing rate was 51 per cent. It hit a 40-year high of 94 per cent in April 2020, under a Coalition government. Of course, some of that was due to special COVID items. Don't want to go back there if COVID is what it takes. But what can we do to make sure our GPs are protected too? They need to be properly remunerated for what is often grinding work with long hours. Good thing I never ended up as a GP. Imagine having to be patient with patients for hours at a time. Having to be kind to the miserable. Just doing that with your own kids is quite enough, let alone with anyone else's. Now we also have to get to work on specialist fees. I've written elsewhere about the insanity of those fees. This week, the Grattan Institute revealed more than one in five Australians who saw a specialist in 2023 was charged an extreme fee at least once. It also said one in 10 Australians who saw a psychiatrist ended up paying $400 in out-of-pocket costs for their initial consultation alone. It also had a list of recommendations. My vengeful self enjoyed some of those, such as stripping Medicare rebates from specialists charging excessive fees, more than others. And I love the idea of the Medical Cost Finder website, designed so people can compare out-of-pocket fees doctors charge for specialist procedures. But last year it was revealed that five years after the site launched, just 20 doctors out of the 36,000 specialists nationwide provided their fees for listing. MORE JENNA PRICE: There are some useful bits, though. For example, your first specialist appointment will see you pay just under $200, and on average, $117 out of pocket. The rest is paid by Medicare. That's across the country. The most expensive is the ACT where the typical specialist fee is $285. Patients will find themselves two hundred bucks out of pocket. I am not entirely sure how the government will sort this out but we urgently need an overhaul of what we pay for our health. Jim Chalmers is talking tax reform and maybe we need some kind of a sliding scale for people whose super balances are above $3 million, more than he's proposing right now. Universities have a part to play too. Maybe they should let more students into medical schools. Maybe free tuition but then bond students to rural and regional areas for 10 years? Are specialist colleges acting in the best interests of Australians? Or in their own financial best interest? I dunno. But whatever we are doing isn't working. May the government's plans work - and once GPs are sorted, let's start working on the rest of the health industry. My GP bulk bills me. My status has been grandmothered. It's a bloody miracle and I'm grateful. I'd personally like to thank former prime minister Gough Whitlam. Medibank, the forerunner to Medicare, was his brainchild. It began in July 1975. But after the Whitlam government was dismissed, the Fraser government buggered it up. Levies on incomes unless you were privately insured. Nine years later, former prime minister Bob Hawke (the National Museum of Australia calls him Robert. Way too formal) established Medicare. He said: "With this historic initiative, all Australians now have a new, simpler and fairer health insurance system." Well, kind of. Stephen Duckett, the absolute full-bottle on Medicare over decades, tells me that bulk-billing is crucial. We had a peak five years ago and it's been downhill from there. "There are good grounds not to have out-of-pocket payments for GPs. And right now, it's a lottery," he says. Duckett's right. When you front up at your GP, you don't automatically know whether you will be in the lucky group to be bulk billed. "You might be asking when you front up," he says. But it's the uncertainty, the possible embarrassment of signing up to pay money you don't have. He commends any government's attempt to get practices to be 100 per cent bulk-billing because then patients get 100 per cent certainty. And getting that 100 per cent certainty about your healthcare matters. Too many of us are not that lucky. News this week that Canberrans are now paying out an average of just over $62 in out-of-pocket fees to see their GPs is unnerving. If you don't have the sixty-odd bucks, you don't go. And that's extremely risky. British research shows us (and Australian research backs it up) that continuity of care is associated with higher life expectancy. If you don't get that care, you die. Well, we all die - but without regular contact with a regular GP, you have a shorter life expectancy. Good access, lower cost, the necessary number of GPs per head of population - these are all associated with longer lives. The cost of visiting the GP is putting many of us off from getting essential health care. Late last year, the ABS reported a rise in the number of people who reported not visiting the GP because of cost-of-living pressures. In the financial year ending June 22, 3.5 per cent of people either put off or didn't see a GP when they needed to because of the cost. Three years later, that number had risen to 8.8 per cent. In February, the gentle warming-up period of the election before everyone got stroppy and out of control, Labor pledged $8.5 billion for Medicare, so all of us would have access to bulk billing by 2030. The plan, according to Labor, would produce patient savings of up to $859 million a year by 2030. It's Medicare's 41st birthday and this investment, if the bulk billing strategy works, is a huge birthday gift to those of us who benefit from universal health care. That is, all of us. In 1984, the annual GP bulk-billing rate was 51 per cent. It hit a 40-year high of 94 per cent in April 2020, under a Coalition government. Of course, some of that was due to special COVID items. Don't want to go back there if COVID is what it takes. But what can we do to make sure our GPs are protected too? They need to be properly remunerated for what is often grinding work with long hours. Good thing I never ended up as a GP. Imagine having to be patient with patients for hours at a time. Having to be kind to the miserable. Just doing that with your own kids is quite enough, let alone with anyone else's. Now we also have to get to work on specialist fees. I've written elsewhere about the insanity of those fees. This week, the Grattan Institute revealed more than one in five Australians who saw a specialist in 2023 was charged an extreme fee at least once. It also said one in 10 Australians who saw a psychiatrist ended up paying $400 in out-of-pocket costs for their initial consultation alone. It also had a list of recommendations. My vengeful self enjoyed some of those, such as stripping Medicare rebates from specialists charging excessive fees, more than others. And I love the idea of the Medical Cost Finder website, designed so people can compare out-of-pocket fees doctors charge for specialist procedures. But last year it was revealed that five years after the site launched, just 20 doctors out of the 36,000 specialists nationwide provided their fees for listing. MORE JENNA PRICE: There are some useful bits, though. For example, your first specialist appointment will see you pay just under $200, and on average, $117 out of pocket. The rest is paid by Medicare. That's across the country. The most expensive is the ACT where the typical specialist fee is $285. Patients will find themselves two hundred bucks out of pocket. I am not entirely sure how the government will sort this out but we urgently need an overhaul of what we pay for our health. Jim Chalmers is talking tax reform and maybe we need some kind of a sliding scale for people whose super balances are above $3 million, more than he's proposing right now. Universities have a part to play too. Maybe they should let more students into medical schools. Maybe free tuition but then bond students to rural and regional areas for 10 years? Are specialist colleges acting in the best interests of Australians? Or in their own financial best interest? I dunno. But whatever we are doing isn't working. May the government's plans work - and once GPs are sorted, let's start working on the rest of the health industry.
The Advertiser
19 hours ago
- The Advertiser
Alarm as destructive tree pest threatens to go national
Biosecurity officials are admitting defeat, saying it is no longer possible to wipe out a destructive species of tree-boring pest from a city's parks. The polyphagous shot-hole borer has proven too tough to handle as the Western Australian government announces it will transition to managing the pest rather than eradication strategies. "The chief plant biosecurity officers from around Australia (initially) determined that eradication was possible," WA Agriculture Minister Jackie Jarvis said on Thursday. The southeast Asian native pest was first identified in Perth in 2021 and tunnels into the trunks and branches of a wide range of species, including Australian native paperbarks and eucalypts. The only effective treatment for affected trees is removal with thousands of trees having suffered the fate in Perth parks, including Kings Park and Hyde Park, and many more likely to follow. "Protecting Perth's tree canopy and our valuable horticulture sector from shot-hole borer remains front and centre for WA," Ms Jarvis said. While the insect is confined to the Perth metropolitan area, the news it can no longer be wiped out has horticulture experts concerned about a national spread. "This is tragic news not just for Western Australia, but potentially for native trees, towns and cities, and the horticultural industry across the entire country," Invasive Species Council policy director Carol Booth said. "Hundreds of native species across the country could be at risk if the borer spreads. "The regular arrival of harmful new invaders shows our prevention systems are not strong enough." Dr Booth expressed concern about the impact of the borer on the urban tree canopy, saying risks to habitats and human health were "immense" if the spread was not contained. Thursday's state budget allocated $26.5 million to the amended borer management plan. But the shift in strategy hasn't gone down well on the other side of the political aisle, with the WA opposition saying the minister must go. "Minister Jarvis has admitted she failed to keep Western Australia protected," shadow agriculture minister Lachlan Hunter said. "That is an extraordinary admission of failure, and she should resign." Opposition Leader Basil Zempilas called on Premier Roger Cook to step in should Ms Jarvis refuse to step down. "The premier should stand up, accept responsibility on behalf of the government and sack Minister Jarvis," Mr Zempilas said. Biosecurity officials are admitting defeat, saying it is no longer possible to wipe out a destructive species of tree-boring pest from a city's parks. The polyphagous shot-hole borer has proven too tough to handle as the Western Australian government announces it will transition to managing the pest rather than eradication strategies. "The chief plant biosecurity officers from around Australia (initially) determined that eradication was possible," WA Agriculture Minister Jackie Jarvis said on Thursday. The southeast Asian native pest was first identified in Perth in 2021 and tunnels into the trunks and branches of a wide range of species, including Australian native paperbarks and eucalypts. The only effective treatment for affected trees is removal with thousands of trees having suffered the fate in Perth parks, including Kings Park and Hyde Park, and many more likely to follow. "Protecting Perth's tree canopy and our valuable horticulture sector from shot-hole borer remains front and centre for WA," Ms Jarvis said. While the insect is confined to the Perth metropolitan area, the news it can no longer be wiped out has horticulture experts concerned about a national spread. "This is tragic news not just for Western Australia, but potentially for native trees, towns and cities, and the horticultural industry across the entire country," Invasive Species Council policy director Carol Booth said. "Hundreds of native species across the country could be at risk if the borer spreads. "The regular arrival of harmful new invaders shows our prevention systems are not strong enough." Dr Booth expressed concern about the impact of the borer on the urban tree canopy, saying risks to habitats and human health were "immense" if the spread was not contained. Thursday's state budget allocated $26.5 million to the amended borer management plan. But the shift in strategy hasn't gone down well on the other side of the political aisle, with the WA opposition saying the minister must go. "Minister Jarvis has admitted she failed to keep Western Australia protected," shadow agriculture minister Lachlan Hunter said. "That is an extraordinary admission of failure, and she should resign." Opposition Leader Basil Zempilas called on Premier Roger Cook to step in should Ms Jarvis refuse to step down. "The premier should stand up, accept responsibility on behalf of the government and sack Minister Jarvis," Mr Zempilas said. Biosecurity officials are admitting defeat, saying it is no longer possible to wipe out a destructive species of tree-boring pest from a city's parks. The polyphagous shot-hole borer has proven too tough to handle as the Western Australian government announces it will transition to managing the pest rather than eradication strategies. "The chief plant biosecurity officers from around Australia (initially) determined that eradication was possible," WA Agriculture Minister Jackie Jarvis said on Thursday. The southeast Asian native pest was first identified in Perth in 2021 and tunnels into the trunks and branches of a wide range of species, including Australian native paperbarks and eucalypts. The only effective treatment for affected trees is removal with thousands of trees having suffered the fate in Perth parks, including Kings Park and Hyde Park, and many more likely to follow. "Protecting Perth's tree canopy and our valuable horticulture sector from shot-hole borer remains front and centre for WA," Ms Jarvis said. While the insect is confined to the Perth metropolitan area, the news it can no longer be wiped out has horticulture experts concerned about a national spread. "This is tragic news not just for Western Australia, but potentially for native trees, towns and cities, and the horticultural industry across the entire country," Invasive Species Council policy director Carol Booth said. "Hundreds of native species across the country could be at risk if the borer spreads. "The regular arrival of harmful new invaders shows our prevention systems are not strong enough." Dr Booth expressed concern about the impact of the borer on the urban tree canopy, saying risks to habitats and human health were "immense" if the spread was not contained. Thursday's state budget allocated $26.5 million to the amended borer management plan. But the shift in strategy hasn't gone down well on the other side of the political aisle, with the WA opposition saying the minister must go. "Minister Jarvis has admitted she failed to keep Western Australia protected," shadow agriculture minister Lachlan Hunter said. "That is an extraordinary admission of failure, and she should resign." Opposition Leader Basil Zempilas called on Premier Roger Cook to step in should Ms Jarvis refuse to step down. "The premier should stand up, accept responsibility on behalf of the government and sack Minister Jarvis," Mr Zempilas said. Biosecurity officials are admitting defeat, saying it is no longer possible to wipe out a destructive species of tree-boring pest from a city's parks. The polyphagous shot-hole borer has proven too tough to handle as the Western Australian government announces it will transition to managing the pest rather than eradication strategies. "The chief plant biosecurity officers from around Australia (initially) determined that eradication was possible," WA Agriculture Minister Jackie Jarvis said on Thursday. The southeast Asian native pest was first identified in Perth in 2021 and tunnels into the trunks and branches of a wide range of species, including Australian native paperbarks and eucalypts. The only effective treatment for affected trees is removal with thousands of trees having suffered the fate in Perth parks, including Kings Park and Hyde Park, and many more likely to follow. "Protecting Perth's tree canopy and our valuable horticulture sector from shot-hole borer remains front and centre for WA," Ms Jarvis said. While the insect is confined to the Perth metropolitan area, the news it can no longer be wiped out has horticulture experts concerned about a national spread. "This is tragic news not just for Western Australia, but potentially for native trees, towns and cities, and the horticultural industry across the entire country," Invasive Species Council policy director Carol Booth said. "Hundreds of native species across the country could be at risk if the borer spreads. "The regular arrival of harmful new invaders shows our prevention systems are not strong enough." Dr Booth expressed concern about the impact of the borer on the urban tree canopy, saying risks to habitats and human health were "immense" if the spread was not contained. Thursday's state budget allocated $26.5 million to the amended borer management plan. But the shift in strategy hasn't gone down well on the other side of the political aisle, with the WA opposition saying the minister must go. "Minister Jarvis has admitted she failed to keep Western Australia protected," shadow agriculture minister Lachlan Hunter said. "That is an extraordinary admission of failure, and she should resign." Opposition Leader Basil Zempilas called on Premier Roger Cook to step in should Ms Jarvis refuse to step down. "The premier should stand up, accept responsibility on behalf of the government and sack Minister Jarvis," Mr Zempilas said.
Perth Now
21 hours ago
- Perth Now
Alarm as destructive tree pest threatens to go national
Biosecurity officials are admitting defeat, saying it is no longer possible to wipe out a destructive species of tree-boring pest from a city's parks. The polyphagous shot-hole borer has proven too tough to handle as the Western Australian government announces it will transition to managing the pest rather than eradication strategies. "The chief plant biosecurity officers from around Australia (initially) determined that eradication was possible," WA Agriculture Minister Jackie Jarvis said on Thursday. The southeast Asian native pest was first identified in Perth in 2021 and tunnels into the trunks and branches of a wide range of species, including Australian native paperbarks and eucalypts. The only effective treatment for affected trees is removal with thousands of trees having suffered the fate in Perth parks, including Kings Park and Hyde Park, and many more likely to follow. "Protecting Perth's tree canopy and our valuable horticulture sector from shot-hole borer remains front and centre for WA," Ms Jarvis said. While the insect is confined to the Perth metropolitan area, the news it can no longer be wiped out has horticulture experts concerned about a national spread. "This is tragic news not just for Western Australia, but potentially for native trees, towns and cities, and the horticultural industry across the entire country," Invasive Species Council policy director Carol Booth said. "Hundreds of native species across the country could be at risk if the borer spreads. "The regular arrival of harmful new invaders shows our prevention systems are not strong enough." Dr Booth expressed concern about the impact of the borer on the urban tree canopy, saying risks to habitats and human health were "immense" if the spread was not contained. Thursday's state budget allocated $26.5 million to the amended borer management plan. But the shift in strategy hasn't gone down well on the other side of the political aisle, with the WA opposition saying the minister must go. "Minister Jarvis has admitted she failed to keep Western Australia protected," shadow agriculture minister Lachlan Hunter said. "That is an extraordinary admission of failure, and she should resign." Opposition Leader Basil Zempilas called on Premier Roger Cook to step in should Ms Jarvis refuse to step down. "The premier should stand up, accept responsibility on behalf of the government and sack Minister Jarvis," Mr Zempilas said.
