A petition aimed at getting the NSW Parliament to debate splitting the Hunter New England Health district into two seperate regions has received the backing of New England's community leaders.
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On Tuesday, several mayors stood alongside Northern Tablelands MP Adam Marshall, as well as nurses and midwives, to sign the petition started by New England Visions 2030.
The MP revealed that Armidale Hospital had been left without a doctor for almost 24 hours between Monday and Tuesday, while he said there were also no security staff and no ward clerk on duty in that time.
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On a regular basis, he said, patients were bypassing underrescourced hospitals in Inverell and Glen Innes and being sent to Armidale, which put a strain on that facility.
The Armidale think-tank's petition calls on the Legislative Assembly to reinstate the New England Area Health Service, directly employ doctors in emergency departments in the region, and dramatically increase the number of nurses.
Mr Marshall said the petition was the result of sheer frustration as concerns raised by nursing staff, clinicians and community advocates had been ignored.
"If we can get 10,000 signatures or more, it will not only trigger a debate in parliament, it will demonstrate to government this isn't just a whinging politician, a few parachocial mayors and the union causing trouble," Mr Marshall said.
"This is actually a whole region united, saying 'we've had a gutful and we're sick to the back teeth of being treated like second-class citizens, we're entitled to better and we're not going to stop until we get better."
Inverell's deputy mayor Kate Dight and mayors Sam Coupland from Armidale, Robert Bell from Uralla and Rob Banham from Glen Innes all signed the petition on Tuesday.
Born in 2005, Hunter New England is the only local health district in the state to include a large metropolitan area and a large rural area.
In March, mayors at the New England joint organisation of councils unanimously voted to investigate the option.
The same month, Northern Tablelands MP Adam Marshall called for the sacking of the district's head, if the service didn't make major changes to its operations.
The breakup is also the policy of the National Party, after a vote at the party's June conference.
The petition declares that "centralised decision making has led to an ignorance of what is required in smaller regional communities" resulting in a "lack of adequate services and the requirement for residents to travel long distances to meet their needs".
The institute has set itself a deadline of September 30 to collect all the signatures. It will be available to sign in local businesses throughout August and September. There is also an online petition.
