Page 1660 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 1 May 2012
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to believe that this individual was acting alone, with no encouragement, no direction, no assistance of any sort—do this for no other purpose than to make the figures look better? If there is no personal or financial gain, the only motive left is to make the government look better. The only motive left is to deal with a political problem that the government was having.
Ms Gallagher said in her response, “I cannot micromanage 20,000 public servants.” She compared this person to a bus driver or someone fixing potholes. That does not wash, because this is a lot closer to home. This is much closer to home. This is a senior administrator of the hospital. This minister, Katy Gallagher, has been minister for six years. She has overseen this directorate. There is a personal connection to this individual. This is not the same as whether or not a bus driver does the wrong thing. This is not the same as whether or not someone fixes a pothole. This is much closer to home.
There are a number of indisputable facts here and there are a number of other things that remain open to questions. The indisputable facts are that this government have misled the community, that they have undermined confidence in the community on the important issue of hospital data, on the important issue of how long people have to wait to get care when they are injured and sick and they go to our emergency department. You can try to limit it to data all you like, but there is a human face to this. There is a human face to this and they have been lied to. Those people have been undermined.
There are other indisputable facts. The manipulation of data happened. We do not know why, we do not know how, we do not know by whom. All we know is that it happened at the heart of Katy Gallagher’s administration.
What is also indisputable is that Katy Gallagher is responsible for this department and has been responsible for the last six years. What kind of culture has she put in place that would see someone, that would embolden someone, to think that manipulating the data for political ends of the government might be a good idea? What kind of leadership has been shown by Katy Gallagher on this issue and in the management of her department? Is it about spin?
We see how much she protects her senior executives. When we saw accusations around bullying and other things she sought to cover them up. She said it was not happening when, indeed, it was. And she still covers that up, to her shame.
So this is about her leadership. This is about her leadership of her department. You cannot be in charge for six years, seek to shut down every critical voice, and then express shock and disappointment when someone with a personal connection to you manipulates data that happens to make you look better.
We are being asked to believe that this government has completely clean hands on this. Forgive us if we are a little sceptical. Forgive us if we are just a little sceptical of what this minister says, given she has been out there misleading the community with false data and she has not even bothered to apologise to the community yet.
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