Pakenham plea for Medicare

MORE than 5100 Cardinia Shire residents have signed a petition calling for a Medicare office in Pakenham.
The petition was presented to Federal Parliament recently by the Liberal MP for McMillan, Russell Broadbent. He congratulated Pakenham resident Charles Edwards for organising the petition.
Mr Broadbent said there was a real need for a Medicare office in the Pakenham district, where the population had grown from 400 or 500 to 27,000 in the 35 years he had lived there.
“The demographic of the community is not a lot different to the demographic of other electorates,” he said. “We have pensioners, carers and people that need government services.
“But they need them where they can access them.”
Mr Broadbent said the fact that the nearest Medicare branch was 20 kilometres away, and that the area lacked suitable public transport, meant there was a real case for a Medicare office in Pakenham.