The 2020-21 Engineering Infrastructure Replacement Program provides $50 million of Victorian Government funding to upgrade or replace prioritised highest critical risk capital plant items and essential engineering infrastructure for acute services in public hospitals across Victoria.
The program aims to improve safety, efficiency and reliability of our public hospitals, and reduce risk to patients, health care workers and service availability.
What's new?
2020-21 funding round now open
The 2020-21 Victorian Budget is investing $50 million in grants to upgrade or replace critical risk engineering infrastructure across Victoria.
Eligible Victorian health services are invited to apply for the High Value Statewide Replacement Fund.
Applications close on 8 February 2021 and can be lodged through the SmartyGrants portal.
See further details below under ‘Submissions process’.
The $50 million Engineering Infrastructure Replacement Program provides Victorian Government funding to upgrade or replace prioritised highest critical risk capital plant items and essential engineering infrastructure across Victoria, including:
air conditioning and heating systems
electrical body protection
building management systems
electrical upgrades
emergency generators and uninterruptable power sources
The 2020-21 funding round is now open - applications close on 8 February 2021.
Making an application
All applications can be lodged through the SmartyGrants portal. The online application form must be completed in its entirety. Further information and supporting documentation should be provided as attachments to the application form.
Technical assistance regarding completion of the online form can be obtained through reviewing the help guide for applicants at SmartyGrants, or emailing SmartyGrants or calling (03) 9320 6888.
The Engineering Infrastructure Replacement Program is available to eligible Victorian acute public hospitals and includes two components:
1. Specific-purpose capital grants are allocated to metropolitan and regional health services to replace in-scope critical at-risk engineering infrastructure valued up to $300,000 (excluding GST). The grants can also be used to replace engineering infrastructure greater than $300,000 (excluding GST) if the health service considers it to be the highest risk of all the outstanding in-scope assets.
2. The High Value Statewide Replacement Fund is available for in-scope single items over $300,000 (excluding GST) that carry high risk in terms of service provision. The fund is managed via a bid-based submission process through which health services submit bids. The assessments, prioritisation and allocations consider a whole-of-system perspective and are prioritised to highest critical risk scores against set criteria.
Health service investments are accountable to asset plans, must maximise value-for-money procurement and must be consistent with government policies, practices and asset management frameworks.
Criteria
Submissions are restricted to the replacement of engineering infrastructure items that sustain existing acute services in Victorian public hospitals and that replace qualifying highest priority critical existing assets that pose an unacceptable and immediate threat to patient/healthcare worker safety. Submissions should ensure the requests:
are in-scope
are ‘project ready’
are end of life
are overdue and time-critical to be replaced/renewed
are mission-critical to service delivery or direct life safety
cannot reliably be undertaken by any other means and have asset and service support shortfalls that cannot be reasonably or acceptably addressed via maintenance
are major technical upgrades to existing imaging equipment to extend effective life and where the clinical benefits and extension of effective life are demonstrated
need due consideration by the programs because without replacement they
- will critically and unequivocally impair health service delivery
- present a strong likelihood of asset and service failure, leading to an untenable gap in business continuity
represent a major breach in mandatory legislative and statutory requirements.
Assessment
Submissions are assessed against an established set of criteria and priority will be given to submissions that address critical risk (patient safety, healthcare worker safety, service availability) and service level weighting in accordance with Medical Equipment Asset Management Framework.
More information
Refer to the 2020-21 Engineering Infrastructure and Medical Equipment Replacement Program – Guidelines in the downloads section below or via the Health.vic website for the following information:
It is vital that our hospitals have access to the latest developments in engineering infrastructure and technology. This program helps improve efficiency and reliability of our public hospitals, and reduce risk to patients, healthcare worker safety and service availability.
The Engineering Infrastructure Replacement Program aims to:
support health services to manage risk and to maintain patient safety, healthcare worker safety, service availability / business continuity and avert unacceptable clinical service interruptions or failures
enable qualifying at-risk critical engineering infrastructure due or overdue for replacement to be replaced in a timely and prioritised way, consistent with statewide strategic and service plans, service delivery needs and asset management plans
sustain at-risk assets that provide essential capacity for delivering responsive and appropriate acute clinical services across Victorian public hospitals
provide a safety net to minimise whole-of-system risks
devolve a level of capital funding to health services’ management, making prioritising the replacement of at-risk assets more flexible, reducing administrative burden and helping to improve asset management
help health services to implement effective asset management that aligns with existing government frameworks and policies
include developing and implementing multi-year essential engineering infrastructure asset management plans for health services consistent with their role in the statewide context and appropriate to the asset management requirements of the health service concerned.