❓ Ms. Evangel asks about the progress of the multi-deck car park at the Queen Elizabeth II Medical Centre. The Minister for Health responds, detailing the completion of the car parks and contrasting the current government's actions with the previous Labor government's plans.
AnsweredQoN 872Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
QUEEN ELIZABETH II MEDICAL CENTRE — PARKING
872. Ms E. EVANGEL to the Minister for
Health:
Before I ask my question, may I
please take a moment to congratulate the newly elected committee members of the
Vietnamese Community in Western Australia who are here in the gallery today,
led by Dr Anh Nguyen, who has been newly re-elected as president. It is lovely
to have you here today.
Anyone travelling around Perth could
not help but notice the construction works taking place on the Queen Elizabeth
II Medical Centre site. I note that progress at Perth Children's
Hospital is going well. Could the minister please update the house on how work
on the multi-deck car park is progressing?
872. Ms E. EVANGEL to the Minister for
Health:
Before I ask my question, may I
please take a moment to congratulate the newly elected committee members of the
Vietnamese Community in Western Australia who are here in the gallery today,
led by Dr Anh Nguyen, who has been newly re-elected as president. It is lovely
to have you here today.
Anyone travelling around Perth could
not help but notice the construction works taking place on the Queen Elizabeth
II Medical Centre site. I note that progress at Perth Children's
Hospital is going well. Could the minister please update the house on how work
on the multi-deck car park is progressing?
AnswerView source ↗
I thank the member for the question.
It is great to be able to announce that we have now completed
all of the multi-deck car parks at the QEII Medical Centre, which provides over
3 000 new bays at that hospital. I am sure members are aware that there has
long been difficulty finding parking around the QEII site. In fact, I am sure
the member for Nedlands knows very well the issues of local government with
numerous cars being parked in all the suburbs around the hospital, as people
desperate to find a parking bay have had to park in side streets and ended up
getting fines as a result of doing that.
The former government was going to do some work at Sir
Charles Gairdner Hospital and build a children's hospital. We have
built a much bigger children's hospital than the former Labor
government was going to build. When it downgraded one of the premier hospitals
in this state, Royal Perth Hospital, from being a tertiary hospital, a large
proportion of its patients would have had no choice but to go to Sir Charles
Gairdner Hospital as an alternative, therefore putting enormous extra pressure
on parking bays at that site. Then, as part of the argument along the way, the
former Labor government was going to increase the number of beds at Sir Charles
Gairdner Hospital from the 550-odd that are there now to 1 000 beds. Who knows
where it would have built the construction. It wanted 250 beds for the children's
hospital and 250 for King Edward Memorial Hospital for Women, so 1 500 beds on
that site, and parking was marked as a possible thing in the distant future.
One of the first things we did when we came to government was
recognise the desperate need for extra parking bays at Sir Charles Gairdner
Hospital. We went to the private sector. That has now been constructed. There
will be a childcare centre on the top of one of those parking bays and all the
parking bays are now available for patients and staff as part of a complex that
will have 900 beds.
We had an issue with United Voice about where the staff would
park during the construction period. We provided two other sites where they
could park offsite and be bussed to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital. During the
negotiations on the nurses' dispute over pay, one of the things we
agreed on was that the key offsite parking site—I think it was at
Graylands—would be kept open for at least a year to give staff who did
not want to pay the parking fees at the hospital somewhere to park and we would
bus them in. We said that if the number of cars at that site went below 50, we
would close it. Three months ago, we closed it because it was getting something
like 20 vehicles a day. The staff at the hospital have embraced the new parking
with open arms and taken up that option of parking on-site; it has been a
resounding success. There are 5 000 parking bays on-site for 900 beds. It is a
fantastic outcome and far better than the opposition could have envisioned when
it put it in the never–never.
It is great to be able to announce that we have now completed
all of the multi-deck car parks at the QEII Medical Centre, which provides over
3 000 new bays at that hospital. I am sure members are aware that there has
long been difficulty finding parking around the QEII site. In fact, I am sure
the member for Nedlands knows very well the issues of local government with
numerous cars being parked in all the suburbs around the hospital, as people
desperate to find a parking bay have had to park in side streets and ended up
getting fines as a result of doing that.
The former government was going to do some work at Sir
Charles Gairdner Hospital and build a children's hospital. We have
built a much bigger children's hospital than the former Labor
government was going to build. When it downgraded one of the premier hospitals
in this state, Royal Perth Hospital, from being a tertiary hospital, a large
proportion of its patients would have had no choice but to go to Sir Charles
Gairdner Hospital as an alternative, therefore putting enormous extra pressure
on parking bays at that site. Then, as part of the argument along the way, the
former Labor government was going to increase the number of beds at Sir Charles
Gairdner Hospital from the 550-odd that are there now to 1 000 beds. Who knows
where it would have built the construction. It wanted 250 beds for the children's
hospital and 250 for King Edward Memorial Hospital for Women, so 1 500 beds on
that site, and parking was marked as a possible thing in the distant future.
One of the first things we did when we came to government was
recognise the desperate need for extra parking bays at Sir Charles Gairdner
Hospital. We went to the private sector. That has now been constructed. There
will be a childcare centre on the top of one of those parking bays and all the
parking bays are now available for patients and staff as part of a complex that
will have 900 beds.
We had an issue with United Voice about where the staff would
park during the construction period. We provided two other sites where they
could park offsite and be bussed to Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital. During the
negotiations on the nurses' dispute over pay, one of the things we
agreed on was that the key offsite parking site—I think it was at
Graylands—would be kept open for at least a year to give staff who did
not want to pay the parking fees at the hospital somewhere to park and we would
bus them in. We said that if the number of cars at that site went below 50, we
would close it. Three months ago, we closed it because it was getting something
like 20 vehicles a day. The staff at the hospital have embraced the new parking
with open arms and taken up that option of parking on-site; it has been a
resounding success. There are 5 000 parking bays on-site for 900 beds. It is a
fantastic outcome and far better than the opposition could have envisioned when
it put it in the never–never.
Explore WA Government Data
Search the full archive in the free dashboard, or query programmatically via API.
Explore more
Government Gazette
Appointments, regulatory notices, planning changes.
Hansard
Debates, questions, speeches and sentiment.
Tabled Papers
Reports and documents tabled in Parliament.
Committees
Committee profiles and recent reports.
Regulations
Subsidiary legislation with filters and summaries.
Bills
Proposed laws and parliamentary progress.
Acts
Current WA legislation and summaries.
Explanatory Memoranda
Bills with EMs (text/PDF) available.
Members
MP profiles, party breakdown and rankings.
Pollie Rankings
Data-driven rankings across 19 categories.
Amendment Chains
Track how schemes and regulations evolve over time.