Here’s an update on a few of the issues AMA Victoria is working on for members, including:
Looking ahead to November- 2026 Victorian Election
E-scooters and e-bikes: Government response and further advocacy
Designated RN prescribing: Victorian implementation update
Inquiry into TAC claims – member input sought.
Looking ahead to November- 2026 Victorian Election
Victoria will go to the polls in November.
AMA Victoria’s election work is already underway. In practice, it never really stops. State elections come every four years and provide a point at which priorities are drawn together, often alongside announcements of large-scale funding commitments, but the underlying advocacy is continuous.
Our core arguments have been put consistently to government and other stakeholders. A properly resourced system. Safe working conditions. A sustainable medical workforce, including training pathways and support for doctors in training. Viable general practice and private specialist care, in the face of rising costs. A system that works as a whole.
That work happens through regular engagement with Ministers, the Victorian Department of Health, regulators and health services. It also extends across the political spectrum. AMA Victoria engages with all parties and remains non-partisan.
It involves putting forward workable proposals, and pushing back where necessary. Both matter. AMA Victoria supports reform where it improves care, and opposes changes that fragment care, shift risk, or add burden without benefit.
In that context, we are seeking input from members on priorities for the next term of government.
At election time, that tends to mean the things political parties actually announce. Funding commitments. New hospitals and Urgent Care Clinics. New services and upgrades to existing hospitals. Infrastructure and system-wide investments that are visible and can be clearly presented. These are often politically attractive, but not always good policy (for example, pharmacy prescribing, which fragments care, introduce conflicts of interest, and raises patient safety concerns.)
Election statements serve a specific purpose. They bring priorities together, give political parties something to respond to, and influence the conversation at a point when attention is highest. They are also necessarily selective.
By the time campaigns are formally underway, many of the major decisions have already been taken even as public attention narrows to a short pre-election window. The timing does not always align. That is why this work starts well before that point.
Much of what shapes doctors’ working lives also sits outside that frame. Administrative requirements, training bottlenecks, referral pathways, regulatory settings and governance within health services. The accumulation of small inefficiencies that affect daily work. These issues are rarely announced and are usually worked through, or avoided, outside the electoral process.
Enterprise bargaining, too, is formally separate, but central. It determines pay, hours, rostering, fatigue management, and job security for public sector doctors. It will shape workforce sustainability across the system. Negotiations are underway and may conclude before the election. In practice, the election context will still influence how this plays out.
Additionally, many of the most consequential policy settings for doctors sit outside the State’s control. Medicare rebates and key regulatory settings are determined at a Commonwealth level. That limits what a state election process can realistically address, and is why AMA Victoria’s work sits alongside that of the federal AMA.
AMA Victoria’s approach reflects all of this. It includes engagement on the larger commitments that feature in elections, and ongoing work on the settings that determine how care is delivered day to day.
Our Getting Rid of Stupid Stuff initiative is one example. It is not tied to the electoral cycle (but will nonetheless feature in our election statement). It provides a direct way to take everyday inefficiencies raised by members into discussions with government and health services, including work to reduce duplication in mandatory training across sites.
The purpose of an election statement is to influence the conversation at a point when attention is highest, and to set out a small number of priorities that are clear, credible and capable of being acted on.
If there are priorities that should be put forward in that context, send them through.
Suggestions can be sent to Principal Policy Adviser Lewis Horton at [email protected].
This work is member-directed. Input keeps the focus on the issues that matter in practice.
E-scooters and e-bikes: Government response and further advocacy
AMA Victoria has received a response from the Victorian Government following our January correspondence on e-scooter safety and recent coronial inquest findings.
The Government confirmed it supports the intent of the Coroner’s recommendations and is progressing work on national product standards to limit the sale of non-compliant devices. It also noted practical challenges in enforcement, including difficulty identifying modified devices, and advised that options such as forfeiture are under active consideration.
We have since written again to raise a related issue.
While current reforms focus on e-scooters, members continue to report injuries associated with e-bikes, particularly higher-powered or modified devices. These present similar risks but are regulated differently.
In Victoria, e-bikes fall within bicycle legislation and are not subject to age restrictions.
By contrast, Queensland is moving to regulate “e-mobility devices” as a category, capturing both e-scooters and e-bikes within a single framework, including proposed minimum age requirements.
We have suggested that a consistent, whole-of-category approach in Victoria would better reflect the capability of newer devices and support aligned safety settings across comparable technologies.
Designated RN prescribing: Victorian implementation update
The Victorian Department of Health has provided a March 2026 update on designated registered nurse (RN) prescribing in Victoria. Members can view the full update here.
This is not a model proposed by AMA Victoria. We have, however, been consulted from an early stage and have engaged to press for a tightly defined model with clear supervision, governance and limits.
The Department’s update reflects a prescribing model intended to operate in partnership with an authorised prescriber, within a formal agreement and clinical governance framework, and following a period of supervised practice. It is distinct from autonomous prescribing models, which AMA Victoria does not support. The update also indicates that initial rollout is intended to be limited to hospital, aged care, palliative care and custodial settings, with commencement dependent on regulatory change later in 2026.
AMA Victoria’s engagement in this process should not be taken as endorsement of broader prescribing expansion. Our focus remains on ensuring that, where changes are being progressed, they are kept within clearly defined, supervised and team-based settings.
Members are welcome to send feedback or questions to [email protected] for follow up with the Department.
Inquiry into TAC claims – member input sought
The Victorian Parliament’s Legal and Social Issues Committee is conducting an inquiry into TAC claims.
The terms of reference focus on how claims are made and assessed, including disputed and fraudulent claims, provider charging above the MBS, and how the TAC interacts with other schemes such as the NDIS.
These areas create scope to raise issues seen in practice, including claim delays and disputes, administrative requirements, fee settings, and scheme interactions.
AMA Victoria will be preparing a submission.
Member input will guide that work. Examples from practice are particularly useful, particularly where they relate to claims processes, fees, or scheme interactions.
Feedback is welcomed by Wednesday 8 April at [email protected].