Page 3054 - Week 07 - Thursday, 30 June 2011
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we can assure ourselves that they are actually doing the right thing, because it would appear that the government is either hiding the facts or does not want to release them.
Another aspect that has come out over the course of the budget is the changing emphasis from the government—and I welcome it—towards our elective surgery waiting times and our emergency department waiting times. There is no question that back in late 2008, 2009 and 2010, when I was first in this place, when we raised the problem of waiting times, the government was somewhat dismissive. I quote from a press release by the minister back in 2009:
It is also important to recognise that elective surgery is just one measure of the health of the public hospital system.
There was a lot of discussion around this, and the minister would downplay the importance of waiting times. I think that focus has changed. I think she does recognise the importance of that, based on the numerous motions we have had in this place and the Auditor-General’s review and through the discussion in the media. I welcome that. But I think what we can see is that there is still a long way to go. The government has talked about doing things in both elective surgery and emergency departments. I note, and I welcome, the funding in the budget for both of those areas.
But when you look at the statistics, I think it is important to make sure we understand the reality of what is going on and separate that from the rhetoric of the government that we are achieving the results when necessarily we are not. When you look at the results from the last quarterly reports for our emergency departments, category 1 patients are being seen immediately. That is good; that is as it should be.
But for category 2, these are people that should be seen within 10 minutes, the percentage of people seen on time has worsened from 82.5 per cent to 80.2 per cent. For category 3, that is urgent, they should be seen within 30 minutes, that has worsened from 60.8 per cent to 55.6 per cent, and that is 20 per cent below target levels. For category 4, semi-urgent, the patients who are meant to be seen within 60 minutes, the percentage of people has worsened by 3.8 per cent and is now 52.9 per cent, which is 17 per cent below targets.
There is a staggering increase in the number of patients who did not wait for treatment and simply gave up. That figure has increased by 14 per cent and is now 6,030 people, which is 753 more than the same period last year. (Second speaking period taken.) I think it is pretty clear that there is more that needs to be done there and I know that we will continue to hold the government to account on that.
The government has recently announced the volunteer program. I think that it has probably got some merit and I look forward to seeing more about that. But I need to emphasise that the sorts of volunteers they are talking about are really to treat the symptom, which is people waiting for an inordinately long time in the emergency departments. They will be providing sort of welfare aid to people that are waiting, in many cases, for up to a day in an emergency department. That is treating the symptom. I think that is necessary and I think that is probably a good idea. But it is not actually treating the problem, which is the fact that they are waiting that long in the first place.
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