Page 491 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 19 February 2020
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MRS DUNNE: Minister, exactly what are you doing, along with the health bureaucrats, to address inefficiencies in the health system, and why are you continuing to rely on cost shifting to Canberrans rather than on really getting on with the job?
MS STEPHEN-SMITH: I am sure that Mrs Dunne is aware that there is not one thing you do to improve the efficiency of health and hospital systems. One of the things that we are doing is the implementation of a timely care strategy, which I know Mrs Dunne has been briefed on previously and which I have talked about many times in this place. That is about improving the flow of patients through our hospital, reducing the amount of time that patients spend in hospital, and reducing bed block so that we can treat more patients.
There are many strategies in place. I have spoken about them many times in this place. There is no one silver bullet. But as we have seen from the numbers, as we have seen from the improvements against the national efficient price and against our peer hospital comparators, we are making improvements, and we will continue to do that.
Opposition members interjecting—
MADAM SPEAKER: Can I ask members to stop the internal chatter because it is difficult to hear the minister responding.
MRS JONES: Minister, after 19 years of a Labor-Greens government, when can the people of Canberra expect the government to manage their hospitals as well as occurs in other jurisdictions?
MS STEPHEN-SMITH: I thank Mrs Jones for the question. Actually, we manage our hospitals extremely well. When you look at the front pages of newspapers in every other jurisdiction, you will see concerns about hospital systems. You will see front pages about ambulance ramping in other jurisdictions. We do not ramp ambulances here in the ACT.
When I get feedback from people who go to hospital, yes, I receive some complaints in my office from people who have not had the world’s best experience in hospitals, but I also get a lot of letters and a lot of feedback from people who have used the Canberra Hospital and who have had an excellent experience, or indeed Calvary Public Hospital in Bruce or the University of Canberra Hospital. We get so much positive feedback about the way our hospitals operate, about our dedicated staff and the support that they give to patients, not only the clinical treatment that patients receive but also the care that is provided to patients in our hospital system.
The ongoing record of those opposite is to talk down our hospital system, to talk down their record of treatment, when what we see from patients coming through the system, and what we record every quarter in the quarterly performance report about people’s own experiences, is satisfaction levels of over 90 per cent, when people are actually asked about the treatment they receive in the hospitals.
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