Page 1780 - Week 06 - Thursday, 19 May 1994
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Mr Connolly: I bet that ruined your whole weekend, Mrs Carnell. I bet it threw you right off your weekend.MRS CARNELL: No; far from it, Mr Connolly. There was music. There was merrymaking. We were dancing on the lawns. The sun shone and the birds sang, Mr Connolly, because we knew that Uncle Terry was in charge.
Mr De Domenico: That is right. Everything was going to be all right. The world's best Health Minister!
MRS CARNELL: Everything was going to be all right. We realised that Uncle Terry, the new health fairy with a magic wand, would fly down and fix the health budget, fix waiting lists, fix the three-year mismanagement of his own Government. Unfortunately, Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, after going back inside, I opened the Andersen report and the latest health activity report for the March quarter and - surprise, surprise! - Canberra's waiting list for elective surgery was still double the national average. Actually it is worse. Two out of every five patients are still waiting for longer than six months for elective surgery; our hospital costs are still 30 per cent higher than the national average and are the worst by far in Australia, including at teaching hospitals; and the budget is still heading for another record blow-out.
Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, my point is simply this: To bring our health system back from the brink of disaster will take much more than a newspaper column and flamboyant media releases, and much more than just a change of Minister. It will require a complete change of philosophy for this Government, a change which a majority of its members have certainly been unwilling to embrace in the past. This matter of public importance today, Mr Connolly, will signal the end of your five-week so-called honeymoon in Health, although I think it finished somewhat earlier. (Quorum formed)
Mr Connolly, your willingness to listen and to consult with health professionals when compared to your predecessor is to be congratulated.
Mr Connolly: If I had known that you were going to say that I would not have called for a quorum.
MRS CARNELL: I was getting to the good bit. You will have to do a lot more. You will have to do a lot more than just have an office at Woden Valley Hospital and arrange photo sessions with doctors and nurses if you really are to make a difference. Certainly, the Minister's PR machine is far slicker than that of Mr Berry's; but, unfortunately, the song must not remain the same. I am sure that you know the words to that one.
So far, Mr Connolly seemingly has embraced the new Arthur Andersen report, but it is worth putting this $180,000 exercise into proper context. This is the fifth report into the Territory's Health Department in five years, and all five reports have managed to come up with similar conclusions and recommendations. It is interesting to note that the fourth report was by Robert Hirth, a partner in Arthur Andersen, who acted as the ACT's chief financial officer for seven weeks. Mr Hirth produced a 135-step plan for improving the financial position of the department. All the reports have highlighted the inadequacies of
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