No doctor was on-call at the hospital from Sunday until Monday morning and five patients had to be transferred to Tumut Hospital for treatment.

Ms Ludford, the GSAHS central sector manager, says the Area Health Service and Dr Mara have a “shared responsibility” for making sure Gundagai Hospital, owned by GSAHS, is staffed by a locum when Dr Mara is not available.

That is “nonsense”, according to Dr Mara, who has worked Christmas Day for 25 out of the 26 years he has been in Gundagai.

“Whose hospital is it? That’s nonsense,” said Dr Mara, a doctor who runs a private practice.

“It’s actually the responsibility of the GP but we might have to agree to disagree with Dr Mara,” Ms Ludford said.

“We assist them (GPs) to provide locums and support them with finding them.”

The issue of doctor services at Gundagai came to a head last Thursday.

Ms Ludford agreed that Dr Mara had given six weeks’ notice of his planned absence from Gundagai last weekend.

Dr Mara said yesterday he was informed that a locum would cover his absence at the hospital but received a phone call to the contrary on Thursday morning from the Gundagai Hospital manager.

“I was told the locum wasn’t coming. I asked why not and they said it had not been approved. I said if they didn’t have a doctor there, at Gundagai on the weekend, they would have my resignation on Monday,” Dr Mara said.

Consequently, a locum was engaged to work from Friday night until Sunday morning.

Ms Ludford said she did not know the details of the telephone call to Dr Mara last Thursday morning from the Gundagai Hospital and could not comment.

“The important thing is that there was a locum for most of the time,” she said.