Page 4023 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 26 November 2014
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In 2010 we called for a board of inquiry. That was rejected. We called repeatedly for open and accountable investigations in this unit. Eventually the government were dragged kicking and screaming, there was a report done that was damning and the government assured us they were fixing this problem. They said, “Yes, we’re on it.” We did not need to bring these things to the Assembly, apparently, because the staff were fixing it.
But in 2012 we were back. And we were back in this place because again concerns were raised. They were not concerns raised by me; they were concerns raised by the royal college of obstetricians, they were concerns raised by the Australian nursing federation and they were concerns raised by patients. We had mothers being pushed out, being kicked out of the maternity ward six hours after giving birth. This was the high quality maternity service that Katy Gallagher assured us after the 2010 review she was going to make sure was first class. Six hours after giving birth, women and their babies were being pushed out of this service.
Ms Gallagher said she was fielding complaints from both mothers and midwives, and the ANF came out and said it was unacceptable. More importantly, the ANF had been ignored. They had warned repeatedly of the concerns that were building and they were ignored.
After that long history of failure, we in this place rightly assumed, based on the assurances that we had received, that these matters had been resolved. But we now know that was anything but the truth. A number of reports came out in the media. Doctors went to the media and doctors came to me—front-line staff, male and female, came to me with significant concerns.
Let me quote, Madam Speaker, from some of the concerns that were raised about the maternity unit in the media, and see whether you can hear the parallels with the issues in 2010 that were then swept under the carpet by this minister—and she has failed over four or five years to fix them. The Canberra Times reported allegations of bullying and mismanagement, the same as we heard in 2010. The article stated:
Doctors have alleged a toxic culture exists at the hospital, with hapless management and departures of senior staff contributing to poor patient outcomes.
That is just what we heard about in 2010. It continued:
One visiting assessor reportedly described Canberra as having “the worst maternity training unit in Australia” …
One doctor said the new Centenary Hospital for Women and Children, opened in 2013, had too few beds and staff being trained faced bullying and unrealistic work demands.
And that is what we heard in the report in 2010—unrealistic work demands. It continued:
Another person with specific knowledge of the situation said serious cultural problems existed and they feared a serious accident or staff suicide …
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