Page 3179 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 22 August 2012
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MS GALLAGHER: Well, Mr Doszpot, I don’t see anyone else standing next to me. Yes, I take responsibility. I have appeared before every committee that I have been asked to. I have taken part in the Auditor-General’s investigation. And could I just point out, in case you guys over there had not realised it, that I was exonerated through that audit process. I provided evidence under oath—evidence under oath. I do not see anyone else standing here taking responsibility, Mr Doszpot.
MR HANSON: A supplementary, Mr Speaker.
MR SPEAKER: Yes, Mr Hanson.
MR HANSON: Minister, how can the community trust your statements about their health system when the Auditor-General has clearly stated that you were wrong in regard to the robustness of data management?
MS GALLAGHER: With the benefit of the Auditor-General’s report, those recommendations are being implemented where we can improve the robustness, but there was internal validation and external validation. In fact, it was through the internal validation processes that this issue originally arose. It was internal validation processes that picked up the original anomaly. Let us not forget that. It was through the internal validation process that this issue was picked up. Then it was the external validation process that drew it to my attention. What you do with that is you look at what the gaps were and then you respond to that and you put in place the recommendations that the Auditor-General has provided. There were additional recommendations from PWC and some decisions that I have taken myself.
MR HARGREAVES: Supplementary.
MR SPEAKER: Yes, Mr Hargreaves.
MR HARGREAVES: Chief Minister, did the PWC report actually address the data validation process? Did it not also find that there was no case to answer in terms of your own good self?
MS GALLAGHER: The forensic audit, as I understand it, looked at 70,000 pieces of evidence in formulating the findings that it made. Its findings are being implemented. They are useful and we are sharing those with other hospitals that use EDIS, because of the nature of the system. EDIS was not set up as a data collection program for the purpose of reporting performance; it has evolved into that. It was a clinical tool that was used by the hospital. Clearly this issue has identified gaps in the service and the provision of safeguards in the EDIS system. That is being worked through.
I thank PWC for the time that they took to do that work. I know that some of the work that they did provided assistance to the Auditor-General as well. But let us not forget that 70,000 pieces of information and evidence were examined as part of the forensic audit, and in not one piece of that evidence was there any question of any wrongdoing on my part.
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