This is despite the fact yesterday’s State Budget is the third to have come and gone since the Iemma Government first mooted the project in June 2006.

Planning for a new hospital for Tamworth was first funded in the budget handed down on June 6, 2006. The project had been listed as a “priority for development” in the NSW infrastructure strategy released the previous week.

On February 23, 2007 – just over a month before last year’s State Election – it was announced Colleen Wilson Health Strategies had been appointed by Hunter New England Health to carry out the study funded in June 2006.

It was reported at the time the study should have been completed by June 30 last year. As late as June 12 and 13, 2007, community meetings involving Colleen Wilson and the Tamworth Health Services Plan Steering Committee were still being held to chart emerging trends in health services demand.

Hunter New England Health Service chief executive Dr Nigel Lyons confirmed yesterday a planning report had been received.

He told The Leader construction work would definitely not be starting on the hospital in the coming financial year.

Mr Iemma had formally pledged $130 million for a new Tamworth Hospital on March 7, 2007 – just over a fortnight out from the State election date.

The $2 million allocated to the Department of Health for the hospital project in yesterday’s State Budget is to be spent on more detailed planning.

Dr Lyons said developing a new hospital was a complex undertaking that required time.

Independent MP Draper said yesterday he was confident work would begin on the construction of the hospital in this parliamentary term.

He was “comfortable” with the progress of financial commitments from the Iemma Government to the

project.

Tamworth-based The Nationals MLC Trevor Khan was not.

“There still appears to be no allocated funding for the commencement of the construction of the new Tamworth Hospital despite this being a promise before the last election,” he said.

The 2006 budget announcement was the subject of a heated exchange in the Legislative Assembly the following day as the result of “Dorothy Dix” style question from Tamworth independent MLA Peter Draper.

The Nationals candidate for Tamworth, Kevin Anderson, had questioned the sincerity of the commitment of $100,000 to prepare plans for the proposed new hospital in a television interview.

Mr Anderson had suggested the money could have better spent on direct service delivery at the hospital.