Page 5128 - Week 17 - Wednesday, 12 December 1990
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The ACT is roughly equivalent in population, as I said, to metropolitan New South Wales area health board catchment areas. Of course, the ACT Board of Health will be directly accountable to me as Minister and will operate subject to the Minister's direction. Board members and the chair will be appointed by the Government. The board must meet at least eight times a year. Members must disclose conflicts of interest. Board members will be indemnified against action taken against them as individuals rather than as a body corporate. The chief executive of the hospital system will be a member of the board. He or she can manage the health services under the board's control on behalf of the board and, of course, subject to its direction. I might say that this is a much better way of keeping in touch with what is going on on a day-to-day basis in the hospital system than using a Minister, such as me, who has responsibility in a large number of areas.
Appointments can be terminated for misbehaviour; physical or mental incapacity; or, for health professional members, if the member ceases to be registered as a health professional. Bankruptcy, criminal convictions or absences except on leave will also result in the termination of appointment. The legislation also provides power to appoint an administrator if the board is incapable of effectively performing its functions or if it is acting improperly.
Apart from the establishment of the board, the Act introduces a significant new provision to the ACT. For the first time this Bill will provide legal protection for health professionals participating in quality assurance activities - that is, unless Mr Berry's amendments are carried. Over recent years, medical practitioners have not been participating in quality assurance processes because of a fear that material produced in this context would later be used against them in civil or criminal proceedings - for defamation, for example. This means that the keystone to the development of high quality standards of service has been missing. Mr Berry knows as well as anybody else what the consequence of that lack of high quality standards of service has been. This Bill provides a mechanism for approved committees to be established by gazettal, so that evidence irrelevant to their activities cannot be compelled and used as evidence for other matters, and that is a significant advance.
Mr Speaker, Mr Berry made reference to some clauses in the Bill which are going to be removed today by the Government under proposed amendments dealing with quality assurance. I might indicate that there has been discussion and consultation with the AMA on this matter. I do not want to go through the history of that, other than to say that the AMA was alerted at an early stage about the prospects for improved standards of quality assurance in our hospital system. I would hope that those opposite would fully share this Government's conviction that we should have high
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