Page 1635 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 18 May 1994
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The other interesting thing about private hospitals is their standards and their quality of care - something that we all care about. As we know, accreditation is very important in the health sector. Two hundred private hospitals, representing 63 per cent of private hospitals, are currently fully accredited. This compares most favourably with the public sector, where only 30 per cent of facilities are accredited.
Mr Berry: It is 100 per cent in the ACT.
MRS CARNELL: And, of course, 100 per cent of the private facilities too. This is not for a moment to suggest that there is something wrong with the public sector. The point I am trying to make here and the issue that we must come to grips with is that the private sector is a very important part of the health sector generally.
Mr Connolly has made many statements about my suggesting another hospital in the ACT. I would like to speak at length about that now, which means that I will probably need an extension. The sort of hospital that I was suggesting, as Mr Connolly was very well aware, was a Port Macquarie model hospital. We have a problem in the ACT with waiting lists. People are waiting for longer than six months for surgery and are very unhappy about access to our current public hospital system. In Port Macquarie the private sector is in the process of building a hospital at absolutely no cost to the New South Wales State Government. They have agreed to contract a certain number of hospital beds back to the public sector. Those beds will be contracted back at a cost and at a quality set under that contractual arrangement.
Mr Stevenson: Not agreed with by the locals.
MRS CARNELL: I think you will find that they have changed now. If the ACT is to have a facility for coronary bypass surgery - something that this Labor Government continually overlooks in its budgetary process - then why not look at the Port Macquarie approach and have a public coronary bypass surgery unit in a private hospital setting on contract back to the public system? It could be a way, Mr Connolly, of ensuring that services are provided to the people of the ACT without people having to go to New South Wales.
I think it is really important to come back to the costs involved. The average cost of a private hospital in Australia per occupied bed day is something in the vicinity of $400. Even assuming that we lift that to $500 to take into account the complexity of cardiac surgery, we still have a figure that is substantially lower than the cost of providing a bed at Woden Valley Hospital, so it would actually be a cost saving exercise as well. If a private company, a private operation, wants to set up in the ACT at no cost to the ACT Government, why in heaven's name should we stop them? They would be providing to people in Canberra and the region services that currently are not available. As we know, per head of population, we have fewer private hospital beds than anywhere else in Australia.
Mr Connolly: Not any more, Mrs Carnell.
MRS CARNELL: Yes, now. Even with the extra 50, we are still lower than anywhere else in Australia. I have the up-to-date figure as of - - -
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