Page 141 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 14 February 2018
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Management and Minister for Urban Renewal) (12.01): I will not be supporting this addition to my amendment, for a number of reasons. Firstly, I gave a very good explanation of why the minimum crewing levels have not been met in my answer earlier on, when I spoke to my amendment to Mrs Jones’s motion. Secondly, we said in my amendment that we will be reviewing this particular measure. Thirdly, in regard to Mrs Jones’s comments now about backfill as an ongoing concern or ongoing problem, backfill is a normal operational procedure for shiftwork.
Mrs Jones: But not to that level.
MR GENTLEMAN: This is what I am trying to point out. Those of us who have worked shiftwork and those of us who have an understanding of workforce capability will tell you that if a shift becomes vacant it needs to be backfilled. It is a normal operational procedure that happens in every shift operation across the country, whether it be in police forces, whether it be in the Australian protective service that I worked in, where I did duty room rosters for quite a number of years, or whether it is in our ACTAS system here. It is a normal operation procedure where you backfill someone that is taking leave, whether it is emergency leave or whether it is recreational leave. It is a matter of operational procedure. I will not be supporting this second amendment.
MR RATTENBURY (Kurrajong) (12.03): I will speak briefly to Mrs Jones’s amendment. The Greens will not be supporting this. I believe, consistent with the additional comments that Minister Gentleman just made, that this point is implicit in a review of whether or not this is an appropriate measure.
MR WALL (Brindabella) (12.04): Madam Speaker, this is classic cover-up 101. This is a case of a minister that is failing on many fronts in his responsibilities for ensuring that the ACT is well covered by an ambulance service that is appropriately equipped. We are not arguing over whether or not the maximum staffing threshold has been met through the year, or whether the ideal staffing threshold has been met through the year. This is the minimum staffing threshold.
Experts within the ACT Ambulance Service and the ACT Emergency Services Agency—the minister’s own departments—have come up with a minimum figure of what is required to resource the Ambulance Service in this territory. Based on that, for the previous financial year this minister has failed to ensure that that is provided, not on one instance, not on two instances, but by his own amendment he highlights 303 shifts in the financial year that were under the minimum staffing standard. That means that Canberrans were at risk on no less than 151 days of the year. That is assuming that they were working on concurrent shifts. Potentially, almost every day of the year there was inadequate staffing in the Ambulance Service.
Bundle that with a health system that is beyond breaking point, that is not meeting minimum standard deliveries and that has waiting lists longer than years, and think of what impact that might have on an ambulance service. We are failing even to staff that adequately. That is an epic failure on this minister’s part and an epic failure that is systemic of this Labor government.
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