Page 2649 - Week 12 - Thursday, 16 November 1989
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future of the Hospital Interim Board of Directors. I know that yesterday in the course of debate on the MPI the Minister said that the Liberal Party was not being helpful when it came to dealing with the hospital crisis, in that it was drawing attention to various features of the hospital scene which, to the Minister's way of thinking, was exacerbating problems within the hospital system. I think it was almost true to say that the Minister was inferring that the Opposition was effectively generating the crisis by reason of the way in which it was handling the issues that came before it.
I reject that assertion. The Liberal Party has not generated a crisis in the hospital system. The Liberal Party has drawn attention to the facts. Fact one is that there has been a serious cost blow-out in our hospital system. The interim board of directors identified that to be $2.5m in the first quarter of 1989-90. That is not made up, Mr Speaker; it is not pulling figures out of the air. It is what the board of directors of our hospital system has said our system is blowing out by.
Fact two is that the board of directors has appealed to the Minister for assistance in dealing with the problems it faces in that situation. It has appealed in particular for political support, not just for administrative backup and, with respect, that support has not been forthcoming from the Minister. The third fact is that the board's days are numbered, according to the Minister for Health. Those were his words: "Its days are numbered". The fourth fact is that the ACT, irrespective of a crisis or problem that our system faces with this blow-out, has the most expensive hospital system in the whole of Australia.
That last fact is enough to urge any responsible government into immediate and decisive action. But the fact that the Liberals take the trouble to point this out and to call for government action on these facts is branded as irresponsible by this Minister, and claims that a crisis has been generated are implied or made by the Minister and by members of the Government. The Liberal Opposition wants to help. It wants to help the situation and it wants to help the ACT get back onto track with a first-class hospital system, to which the Minister so often refers.
I think we can help the Government do that by clearing the air here and now on the future of the hospital management system, because the future of that system is fundamental to the way in which the Government deals with the problems of the hospital system. It cannot tackle the problems it faces without a good system of management. There is a need to address the blow-out and the cost overruns that have been identified and the restructuring problems that are going to arise because of the restructuring of the hospital system as a whole. But the issue of management is at a different level. The Minister's attention to the problems I have just identified is to some extent overshadowed by his ambiguous comments or signals on the future of the hospital board.
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