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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 7 Hansard (29 June) . . Page.. 2292 ..

MR OSBORNE (continuing):

I would first like to highlight several aspects of the health portfolio that greatly concern me.

First cab off the rank is the on-going difficulties our nurses face in the Canberra Hospital. Since I became a member in this place over five years ago the working conditions and practices of our public hospital nurses have been constantly attacked. There are now fewer and fewer nurses doing more and more work and, rather than becoming more efficient, as the minister would prefer to think, I believe the truth is that this resource is being stretched close to breaking point. I have lost track of the number of times the nurses union has been before the industrial relations commissioner and won hands down. Last year we saw the minister offer 15 redundancies to nurses, all of which were taken up, while this year we are now short of nurses and desperately trying to hire them. Guess how many, Mr Speaker.

I know that the minister just this week instigated a review into how many public hospital nurses we have and how many we need. I have to say that I have two concerns about that. The first is that the review will be done by his department and not at arm's length, and the second is that there is no hint in this review to suggest that there is an intention to restrict nurses from working 16 and 18-hour shifts. Yesterday this minister seemed proud that all those nurses who have worked those long exhausting shifts have done so voluntarily. That may indeed be the case, but the regular need for such extended shifts suggests that something is very wrong with the way this resource is being managed.

Last year the minister said our public hospitals had 15 nurses too many. Now we hear claims by the nurses union that we need up to 100 extra nurses to cope with their regular workload. The minister has rejected the nurses union's claim outright simply on the ground that he thinks it is too expensive, not that the nurses are wrong. Experience shows us that the union has the better batting average on these matters in the Industrial Relations Commission, and I suspect the truth is far closer to their estimate than the minister's.

It is my intention shortly to table legislation relating to the work practices of nurses. This legislation will be similar to a law recently enacted in California to bring into effect three reforms to ensure patient safety. These are: first, minimum nurse to patient ratios in our public hospitals; second, restriction on the use of untrained staff in hospitals to perform certain nursing functions; and third, a restriction on excess shifts and recall shifts for nurses under certain circumstances.

I have been following the progress of the Californian legislation for over a year, Mr Speaker, as it progressed through their parliamentary process, and have regularly monitored their community debate. Interestingly, this legislation drew national attention across the United States community as community groups gave it enthusiastic support, while hospitals, other medical service providers and insurance companies gave it stern opposition.

The Nurses Staffing Act, as it is now called in California, is based on numerous scientific studies in the United States in the 1990s. These scientific studies clearly show the direct correlation between safe staffing practices and positive outcomes from patients. Specifically, higher nurse to patient ratios resulted in lower mortality rates, less re-hospitalisation after discharge, increased patient satisfaction, increased compliance with

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