Key Points
- A report found 33 people died after waiting too long for emergency calls to be answered
- The authority is supposed to answer 90 per cent of calls within five seconds
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has personally apologised for the deaths of 33 people following adverse events linked to ambulance call delays and other issues.
A report detailing the findings by the state's Inspector-General for Emergency Management was released on Saturday.
Two senior ministers publicly apologised on behalf of the Victorian government but Mr Andrews went a step further on Tuesday during his first public appearance in three days.
"I offer my deepest condolences and sympathies and my personal apology - and the apology of the government more broadly - to anybody who has been touched by this virus and particularly those who have lost a loved one," he told reporters in Frankston.
"You can imagine the pain and the great burden those families carry with them every single day and we extend those condolences and that apology with a sense of commitment not only to those individuals but a commitment to every single Victorian to make the change, to make the improvements, the investments.
"That's what we are doing now."
The government was made aware of the Emergency Service Telecommunications Authority's precarious financial position as early as 2015.
Its funding model didn't allow for its response to be rapidly scaled up when COVID-19 hit, according to the report.
The authority is supposed to answer 90 per cent of calls within five seconds.
But figures blew out to completely unacceptable levels after Victoria moved away from lockdowns in October 2021.
and one caller waited more than 76 minutes.
The government in May vowed to recruit and train almost 400 extra call-takers and about 150 have already started, helping lift the ambulance call response rate to 86.2 per cent within five seconds throughout June.
