Page 3065 - Week 07 - Thursday, 1 July 2010
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But allowing people to manage the business of the hospital properly allowed real gains for the people of the ACT. Indeed, it improved access to elective surgery. That is why we got to that low point of 3,488. It is the lowest it has been for some time, but it was working. Instead, the Stanhope crisis injection of $6 million and the implementation of the Reid review has, in fact, seen the list spiral out of control, trending upwards for the entire nine years of Labor management of the health system. That is at the heart of the problem. Labor cannot manage. They cannot manage their budgets, they cannot manage the health system, they cannot manage their own policy and they do not tell people the full story.
I can recall in estimates in 2002-03 there was one case where, if I remember the numbers correctly, growth was something like 15 per cent. Yet the government had only forecast seven per cent additional funds. The Chief Minister made the extraordinary statement yesterday, “Yes, we knew that and we expect there will be some pain.”
The pain is being felt by the David Wentworths, by the Allan McFarlanes and by those individuals who do not get access to the services they require. It is genuine and real personal physical pain. We forget the words “the people” that appear up there on the coat of arms for the ACT. It is not about the press release; it is not about ministerial egos; it is about the people and the services that we deliver. In this health budget, there is no clear path forward to deliver better health services for the people of the ACT.
We have had the minister all over the place during question time this week. She was asked what was health growth. Well, it was 10 per cent one question, the next question it was nine per cent. But, as we know, the increased funding in the outyears is between six and seven per cent. So there is a gap that emerges—
Ms Gallagher: Which is about five per cent more than you ever factored into your forward estimates, Brendan.
MR SMYTH: We will come back to that, because it is interesting.
Ms Gallagher: Yes.
MR SMYTH: Whenever they are in trouble they run back nine years and say, “You did not do anything.” It is quite a cheek—
Ms Gallagher: What did you do about funding health growth?
MR SMYTH: because before your time, Ms Gallagher, and I am keeping a close—
MR ASSISTANT SPEAKER: Order! Order, members! Mr Smyth has the call.
MR SMYTH: I will forgive you because you do not have the memory of this. We were the government that put growth funding into the health budget. What did the Labor Party of the day call it? They called it a slush fund. How irresponsible! We put in growth funding, which is now a standard feature of health budgets, because we all
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