Page 3739 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 28 October 2015
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In relation to the report, Mr Hanson can selectively quote one part of the report if he wishes, but he should, if he wanted to be forthright and full in his accounting of the report, recognise the deeply seated cultural issues that exist between junior doctors and senior doctors. The issue for ACT Health management is to make sure that their procedures and their processes respond appropriately when complaints are made, and that is why I have made sure that not only senior clinicians are represented on this leadership committee that I have convened, but senior management as well.
MADAM SPEAKER: A supplementary question, Mrs Jones.
MRS JONES: Minister, how can the people of Canberra trust that your actions will fix the toxic culture at Canberra Hospital when the AMA has categorically stated that you will inevitably fail?
MR CORBELL: I draw Mrs Jones’s attention to my previous answer. This is not going to be an easy problem to solve, because it is a culture and a series of behaviours that have become embedded in far too many relationships between senior doctors and junior doctors across the country. Indeed, there is a view among some doctors that, now that they are senior, they should behave in exactly the same way their seniors behaved towards them when they were trainees. That is the problem. “We put up with it, so you should put up with it” was one of the comments made in the KPMG report. It is not good enough.
Mr Hanson interjecting—
MR CORBELL: How patently ridiculous for the person who claims he is a future leader of this territory to ignore the assumptions and the conclusions of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and ignore all of the cultural evidence that this is a deep-seated cultural problem across the medical profession that dates back to, probably, well before the Second World War. That is the sort of culture we are talking about. That is the sort of problem we are talking about. For him, everything is an opportunity for a political attack. For him, everything is a shallow, simplistic line for him to criticise this government. If he wants to be minister for health, he needs to understand that he is going to have to show real leadership in responding to the issue of culture. He is going to have to demonstrate real insight. So far he has failed dismally.
MADAM SPEAKER: A supplementary question, Mrs Jones.
MRS JONES: Minister, when did you last meet with the AMA about this issue?
MR CORBELL: I met with the AMA a number of months ago. I have another meeting scheduled with them next month. To the best of my knowledge, the AMA have not raised this matter with me.
ACT firefighters—wellbeing study
MR SMYTH: My question is to the minister for emergency services. Minister, an article in the Public Service News Online this month noted that firefighters from ACT
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