Page 3258 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 21 August 2018
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MRS DUNNE: Look at some of the language used in the minister’s statement. The minister says that the issue of ligature points is under active management. One of the criteria we failed as a high risk was that we had not addressed the issue of ligature points. We heard in an answer from Mr Rattenbury in question time two sitting weeks ago that that issue is not completely resolved and that there is not a final timetable for resolving that. So having it under active management is the best that we can possibly say about it. There is a lot of work to be done.
To be as brief as possible, what we are seeing today is a minister who has fessed up to the fact that we have a poor culture in ACT Health and the hospital system and that somehow, sometime in March, ACT Health and the hospital system had this Damascus-like conversion and since then everything is on an upward trajectory. From what the minister and Mr Rattenbury have said on previous occasions, and from the clear message today, March was some magical period and now everything is rainbows and unicorns. The minister may not like the fact that the opposition does not believe her spin and does not accept her spin, but if you read the words of the minister today, they are purely about spin.
I am not yet convinced that March created this Damascus-like conversion in ACT Health and that everything is on an upward trajectory. The Liberal opposition is not convinced that the anticipated October splitting of the organisation will give greater autonomy and clarity to policy settings and the delivery of health services in the ACT. Quite the contrary—we believe this will be a backward step, a step back to how ACT Health was a few years ago, and that it is change for change’s sake.
We can have all the leadership forums we like, but that will not change the delivery of health services until we have a coherent health system which first and foremost addresses the culture in ACT Health. I am very hopeful some of the issues outlined here will address the culture in ACT Health, but there needs to be leadership from the very head.
To my knowledge, the minister has two instances in her email inbox where members of ACT Health have disclosed to her—and in one case to every member of this Assembly—things that are going wrong in the ACT health system and the way staff have been bullied over a long and sustained period. There is no confidentiality about those matters; they have been publically aired by the people.
I refer the minister to those emails and I challenge her to show leadership: to show how those people who disclosed matters to her and Minister Rattenbury, and in one case every member of this Assembly, have had a respectful pathway; to show how after disclosing to this minister she has ensured all the systems in ACT Health work to protect them, the people about whom those disclosures have been made and the people who have been bullied; to have the situation independently investigated by somebody who does not have a stake in the game; and to come to a conclusion about how those very serious issues, if they are true, can be addressed in a professional and respectful way.
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