Page 3906 - Week 14 - Tuesday, 23 October 1990
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
Humphries is being snowed. I believe that there is a problem in getting hold of what is actually happening in the Ambulance Service. I would ask you to compare the statement made in the Chronicle on 23 October by a senior officer involved in the Ambulance Service. He is referring to staff shortages, which are reported in this paper, and he says:
It hasn't caused any problems. Nobody has been lacking in service as far as we know, based on our computer monitoring.
I would ask you not to base this on the computer monitoring but to base it on the actual experiences of the staff concerned and the experiences of the people requiring ambulance services. That is what Mr Berry has provided us with here. The computer monitoring will not tell you whether or not people are satisfied with the service. Quite obviously, somebody with a broken jaw and other injuries waiting 55 minutes for an ambulance would in no way be satisfied. Quite obviously, somebody with a broken leg who waited an interminable time on a Saturday afternoon for an ambulance would not be satisfied with the service. This was an incident that I saw at a football game. But the first thing people do is not rush out to complain; when they are in hospital they are grateful to be fixed at all. It is not a matter of the computer monitoring. It is a matter of the community confidence in that service and it is a matter of the professional job satisfaction of the officers involved in the service. If you rely on your computer information, you will never get the full figure.
Mr Humphries has not addressed the questions Mr Berry has posed. He has not responded in a detailed way or in a convincing way to any of the issues that Mr Berry has raised. On behalf of the Labor team in this Assembly, I say that we realise that there is a difficulty with the Ambulance Service, and there has been a difficulty for some time with the Ambulance Service. One of the major difficulties is in actually getting hold of the facts of what is occurring, and I would like to see those difficulties resolved. I can assure Mr Humphries that, if there is any way in which we can assist in resolving those problems, then we stand ready to do so. But simply to deny the facts is not helpful. What we need here, I believe, is an open approach to the provision of this service in the community, an approach that recognises that there have been problems for some years, probably; an approach which recognises that it is the community's confidence and the service provided to the community which are at stake here, not our egos in this Assembly.
Mr Speaker, in conclusion, if there is anything which the Labor team here can do by way of service on committees or assistance in providing the Minister with information which we have, then we stand ready to assist in that way.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .