❓ The Minister for Health addresses the Shadow Minister's comments on bed shortages, non-clinical staff roles, and privatisation, highlighting perceived inconsistencies in the Shadow Minister's stance on upskilling programs and hospital capacity.
AnsweredQoN 484Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
HEALTH — SERVICES PRIVATISATION —
COMMENTS OF SHADOW MINISTER
484. Ms A.R. MITCHELL to the Minister for Health:
I understand that the shadow Minister for Health has been
making numerous comments recently about bed shortages, the role of non-clinical
staff in treating patients, and the privatisation of services. Could the
minister please update the house on the shadow minister's comments?
COMMENTS OF SHADOW MINISTER
484. Ms A.R. MITCHELL to the Minister for Health:
I understand that the shadow Minister for Health has been
making numerous comments recently about bed shortages, the role of non-clinical
staff in treating patients, and the privatisation of services. Could the
minister please update the house on the shadow minister's comments?
AnswerView source ↗
I thank the member for the question.
The shadow minister has been out lately speaking on a few
recent issues and I want to highlight some of those. Members will be aware that
the commonwealth Minister for Mental Health and Ageing, Hon Mark Butler, put
out a press release urging the upskilling of people working in hospitals—something
I have to say that I strongly support—and has provided funding.
Therefore, the federal government is trialling the program so that people
working in hospitals in roles such as nutrition, cleaning, personal care and
physiotherapy will be involved in an upskilling program to assist them in
taking care of patients in hospitals. Cleaners, therefore, will be given
additional training to help them take care of patients in hospitals. Then I
heard the shadow minister on the radio saying that he thinks it is a good idea.
I think it is a good idea, so I agree with him. I was therefore fairly
surprised to see an advertisement that had been put out about the member for
Swan Hills.
Mr F.A. Alban : In
beautiful colour!
Dr
K.D. HAMES : It refers to the privatisation of the new Midland hospital.
Members know that we are contracting out the services of the hospital. The ad
goes on to say that when last in power the government privatised services at
Royal Perth Hospital. I will just refresh the memory of members on what
happened. Patient care assistants were contracted and trained to undertake some
of the duties of cleaners in their hospital so that they and the cleaners would
get extra training to work at Royal Perth. I have to say that it did not work.
I have agreed with opposition claims that as a result there was a big outbreak
of infection at that hospital and the program was canned because it did not
work.
So here we have on one hand the
shadow minister going out campaigning against getting cleaners and PCAs to do
additional work in hospitals and saying what a dreadful idea that is—he
has been going out with his union puppeteers opposing stuff like this—and
on the other hand, as soon as the federal government ups and says that it will
do exactly the same thing, there he is in the media kowtowing to the
commonwealth government, as Labor members usually do, saying what a wonderful
idea it is. Suddenly it is a wonderful idea. I wonder how that will affect
Labor's campaign in Midland.
Mr M. McGowan : You
make it up as you go along. That's a fabrication.
Dr K.D. HAMES :
Which bit is a fabrication?
Mr M. McGowan :
What you just said; basically everything.
Dr K.D. HAMES :
Which bit? I have the statement by the commonwealth minister. I have the
statement in the media by the shadow minister, Roger Cook, which states, ''Certainly
in a hospital environment we have to make sure that we maintain services.''
Several members interjected.
Dr K.D. HAMES : The
shadow minister is clearly supporting the commonwealth position. The other
issue is about hospital capacity.
Several members interjected.
The SPEAKER :
Member for Armadale!
Dr K.D. HAMES : The
shadow minister made two comments about the capacity of hospitals in the state.
One was that the decision not to provide the capacity in our hospitals by the
Barnett government was a bad decision for health in this state. It went on
further to refer to the winter flu season and how the government should have
provided capacity in this state. Why are we not providing capacity? It is
because we do not have enough beds. Why do we not have enough beds? Let us go
back to the management of the extra beds that we needed in this state.
We have a plan in health to work out how many beds we need.
We have a thing called a clinical services framework, which covers 10 years.
The Labor Party put one out in 2005, which said that by 2010 the demand would
have grown to such a degree that we would need extra beds in this state. The
Labor government decided to build Fiona Stanley Hospital and upgrade Joondalup
Health Campus and make sure that it provided the beds we needed. That was due
in 2010. In 2005 when the cost had gone from $420 million to $742 million, the
completion date was 2011. By December 2006 the cost had gone up to $1 billion
and the completion date was to be 2012. By December 2008 the cost had gone up
to nearly $2 billion. In April 2008 the Labor government advised that instead
of a 2010 completion date, which was when we desperately needed the beds
according to the clinical services plan, Fiona Stanley was not going to open
until 2014. Joondalup hospital was in a similar situation. It was supposed to
be open in 2009, but the first beds were not open until 2011. The Labor Party
in government delayed construction of those beds to such an extent that it
totally messed up the Department of Health's proper planning to provide
additional beds. Our hospitals are now chock-a-block. Members opposite say that
we should put in extra beds. We have to have space in a hospital to put in
extra beds. We need somewhere physically to locate those beds. What have we
done in the four years that we have been in government? We have built the $2 billion
Fiona Stanley Hospital, which is nearly at completion. We put in the extra $100
million that was needed for the Joondalup hospital. We have addressed the
demand for beds during our four years of government, which is something the
Labor government should have done in 2010 because they were desperately needed.
The shadow minister has been out lately speaking on a few
recent issues and I want to highlight some of those. Members will be aware that
the commonwealth Minister for Mental Health and Ageing, Hon Mark Butler, put
out a press release urging the upskilling of people working in hospitals—something
I have to say that I strongly support—and has provided funding.
Therefore, the federal government is trialling the program so that people
working in hospitals in roles such as nutrition, cleaning, personal care and
physiotherapy will be involved in an upskilling program to assist them in
taking care of patients in hospitals. Cleaners, therefore, will be given
additional training to help them take care of patients in hospitals. Then I
heard the shadow minister on the radio saying that he thinks it is a good idea.
I think it is a good idea, so I agree with him. I was therefore fairly
surprised to see an advertisement that had been put out about the member for
Swan Hills.
Mr F.A. Alban : In
beautiful colour!
Dr
K.D. HAMES : It refers to the privatisation of the new Midland hospital.
Members know that we are contracting out the services of the hospital. The ad
goes on to say that when last in power the government privatised services at
Royal Perth Hospital. I will just refresh the memory of members on what
happened. Patient care assistants were contracted and trained to undertake some
of the duties of cleaners in their hospital so that they and the cleaners would
get extra training to work at Royal Perth. I have to say that it did not work.
I have agreed with opposition claims that as a result there was a big outbreak
of infection at that hospital and the program was canned because it did not
work.
So here we have on one hand the
shadow minister going out campaigning against getting cleaners and PCAs to do
additional work in hospitals and saying what a dreadful idea that is—he
has been going out with his union puppeteers opposing stuff like this—and
on the other hand, as soon as the federal government ups and says that it will
do exactly the same thing, there he is in the media kowtowing to the
commonwealth government, as Labor members usually do, saying what a wonderful
idea it is. Suddenly it is a wonderful idea. I wonder how that will affect
Labor's campaign in Midland.
Mr M. McGowan : You
make it up as you go along. That's a fabrication.
Dr K.D. HAMES :
Which bit is a fabrication?
Mr M. McGowan :
What you just said; basically everything.
Dr K.D. HAMES :
Which bit? I have the statement by the commonwealth minister. I have the
statement in the media by the shadow minister, Roger Cook, which states, ''Certainly
in a hospital environment we have to make sure that we maintain services.''
Several members interjected.
Dr K.D. HAMES : The
shadow minister is clearly supporting the commonwealth position. The other
issue is about hospital capacity.
Several members interjected.
The SPEAKER :
Member for Armadale!
Dr K.D. HAMES : The
shadow minister made two comments about the capacity of hospitals in the state.
One was that the decision not to provide the capacity in our hospitals by the
Barnett government was a bad decision for health in this state. It went on
further to refer to the winter flu season and how the government should have
provided capacity in this state. Why are we not providing capacity? It is
because we do not have enough beds. Why do we not have enough beds? Let us go
back to the management of the extra beds that we needed in this state.
We have a plan in health to work out how many beds we need.
We have a thing called a clinical services framework, which covers 10 years.
The Labor Party put one out in 2005, which said that by 2010 the demand would
have grown to such a degree that we would need extra beds in this state. The
Labor government decided to build Fiona Stanley Hospital and upgrade Joondalup
Health Campus and make sure that it provided the beds we needed. That was due
in 2010. In 2005 when the cost had gone from $420 million to $742 million, the
completion date was 2011. By December 2006 the cost had gone up to $1 billion
and the completion date was to be 2012. By December 2008 the cost had gone up
to nearly $2 billion. In April 2008 the Labor government advised that instead
of a 2010 completion date, which was when we desperately needed the beds
according to the clinical services plan, Fiona Stanley was not going to open
until 2014. Joondalup hospital was in a similar situation. It was supposed to
be open in 2009, but the first beds were not open until 2011. The Labor Party
in government delayed construction of those beds to such an extent that it
totally messed up the Department of Health's proper planning to provide
additional beds. Our hospitals are now chock-a-block. Members opposite say that
we should put in extra beds. We have to have space in a hospital to put in
extra beds. We need somewhere physically to locate those beds. What have we
done in the four years that we have been in government? We have built the $2 billion
Fiona Stanley Hospital, which is nearly at completion. We put in the extra $100
million that was needed for the Joondalup hospital. We have addressed the
demand for beds during our four years of government, which is something the
Labor government should have done in 2010 because they were desperately needed.
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