Page 2366 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 16 September 1992
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Belconnen, section 76, blocks 6 and 7.
Duffy, section 37, block 13.
Evatt, section 25, block 12.
Florey, section 50, block 4.
Fyshwick, section 28, block 1.
Hall, section 3, block 13.
Higgins, section 36, block 13.
Hughes, section 41, block 5.
Kambah, section 228, block 1; section 461, block 33; section 494, block 4; section 518, block 5.
O'Connor, section 55, block 8.
Spence, section 33, block 3.
Watson, section 58, block 7.
INDEPENDENT HEALTH COMPLAINTS UNIT
Ministerial Statement and Paper
MR BERRY (Minister for Health, Minister for Industrial Relations and Minister for Sport), by leave: Today I wish to release a discussion paper on the establishment of an independent health complaints unit in the Australian Capital Territory and, in doing so, I would like to make a few points. Firstly, Labor is committed to the best health care system possible; but the best means more than just best staff and equipment, though that is also our goal. The best includes the most responsive and the most accessible, the most flexible and the most open health system. Proper, fast and effective handling of complaints, I am sure members will appreciate, is a crucial part of such a system.
Secondly, establishing such a unit is in no way a reflection upon the superb health staff and institutions we have in the ACT, public and private. We can be proud of what we have, whilst being determined to make it better. Not even the best systems, I am sure members will agree, are perfect. As health systems get bigger, more complicated and more diverse, mistakes will happen. We need to be able to rectify those mistakes, not assume that they are the price to be paid for a modern health system. That price, in what is often avoidable pain and misery, is too high to be allowed to continue.
This proposal has been a long time coming. In 1990, during debate on the Health Services Bill, the Australian Labor Party sought to retain proposals for improved quality assurance. These were rejected by the Kaine Government in one of its many, what I have described as, anti-community decisions. We knew that a complaints unit was needed, however, and put it in our election commitments for 1992. In the last couple of days two very important election commitments made by the Australian Labor Party have surfaced.
Such a unit is needed for many reasons. In spite of the conservative ideology many commentators follow, problems with health care are not confined to the public sector. Canberra health consumers continually complain to me about the quality of care from the private sector, but up until now there was nowhere for aggrieved consumers to go. Registration boards are limited to dealing with cases of individual misconduct, and such episodes are the small minority of complaints. Nevertheless, I look forward to the cooperation of the registration boards, whose members give their time free out of a commitment to the health care of Canberra, to be a key part of the complaints handling system.
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