Page 3350 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 17 August 2010
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Certainly, some issues have been identified in relation to a clinical investigation, but it is to the minister’s great credit that she initiated the inquiry. She has actually responded very positively to it. I have to say that she commissioned it in the face of issues raised by doctors and others within the community that actually cast a pall over clinical outcomes.
In the context, one of the things that are understated in the report—I will just go to this as my time is almost up—is that, in terms of clinical outcomes, the head finding is that both Canberra Hospital and Calvary Public Hospital perform consistently with comparable hospitals in Australia and New Zealand. Let us then go to the body. I think it is unfortunate that in that brief summary at the head of this report it does not repeat or reveal precisely what the report then finds—that in relation to all of the clinical outcomes at the hospital, consistent with the Australian Council on Healthcare Standards, the ACT exceeds national standards in relation to 16 of the 19 listed. In other words, it is probably the best performing obstetrics unit in Australia. (Time expired.)
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for the Environment, Climate Change and Water, Minister for Energy and Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (11.28): This motion today fails the test. As the Chief Minister and the Minister for Health have outlined, it fails the fundamental tests that any opposition has to meet if it is serious about moving a motion of no confidence in a minister.
What have we heard from the Liberal Party today? As the Chief Minister has said, we have heard the ludicrous suggestion that the minister should resign because an accounting standard changed, that the minister should resign because she did not act on complaints that were not brought to her attention. That is the fundamental failure of this no-confidence motion today. It fails the test. It fails the test fundamentally. What we have seen, and what the minister has clearly outlined in her statement today, is at all times a minister acting diligently, listening, responding and protecting the public interest when it comes to the operation of the ACT’s public health system.
Let us just go through the reasons why the government wanted to acquire Calvary Public Hospital. In a small jurisdiction, it makes no sense whatsoever to have two public hospitals which do not coordinate the delivery of public healthcare services, where there is no ability to effectively control and manage the delivery of public money to improve and provide public health services. It was an issue when I was the Minister for Health and it is an issue today. It makes no sense for this to occur.
Let me give you a good example. Right now, Calvary Public Hospital refuse to take additional maternity care cases because they say they have reached their quota. They send it to Canberra Hospital, and Canberra Hospital has to pick up the slack. Does that make sense? Does it make sense that one public hospital can simply refuse to share the load and another public hospital has to pick it up? No. That is the situation we face in relation to these governance arrangements.
One public hospital, because it is not under the operational control of the public health authorities, can refuse to accept additional cases—in this case, maternity cases—and it
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