Page 2103 - Week 07 - Thursday, 20 August 2020
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Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith, as the health minister, is directly responsible for this pay issue. I do not want to blame pay clerks. They have a terrible system to work with. They are just as ground down as the junior doctors. It is not the problem of the pay clerks.
Mr Hanson: Come on, comrades; support the workers, comrades.
MRS DUNNE: Thank you, Mr Hanson. It is ironic that in the week that I have been talking about the use of the workers’ symbols, the hammer and sickle, the party that purports to support the workers comes in here and will not agree to an audit to see whether people are being paid.
I will tell you what, Madam Assistant Speaker, if we had an audit and it came back and said, “The junior doctors are wrong; everybody has been paid and it is all tickety-boo,” I would be overjoyed. My colleagues would be overjoyed. But we do not think that that is the case. We think that there needs to be an audit and we need to be prepared to face up to a very big bill in back pay.
It is a serious matter. There are lots of doctors in the system—probably 500 or 600 over the period—all of whom have suffered in this way and all of whom are probably entitled to some back pay. The performance here today of these ministers in this coalition government—the coalition of the left, the workers’ friends—has been utterly appalling.
I look forward to Mr Pettersson standing up and talking about wage theft in the debate on this motion. I dare him. With many of the people who have come to me and who talk about their issues at ACT Health, I refer them to the Fair Work Commission, because that is the only recourse they have, because this government does not care about them. Do they think that because they are doctors, they are not worthy of support?
They are junior doctors and, as somebody said to me in relation to the junior doctors, they treat them like fodder. They employ them, they come here for a year or so, they burn out and they go somewhere else. That is why the ACT health system cannot attract doctors. That is why the ACT health system have a culture problem. That is why the ACT health system have found it difficult to get locums to come here, even before COVID. That is why the ACT health system have doctors who are desperate for leave and who cannot take leave because there is no one to backfill. They will not just walk away; they will not leave their patients.
The Canberra Liberals will not support Mr Rattenbury’s amendments. We stand by our call for an audit. We will demand an audit, and we will keep demanding an audit until there is one.
MS STEPHEN-SMITH (Kurrajong—Minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Affairs, Minister for Children, Youth and Families and Minister for Health) (3.41): Very briefly on the amendments, and for the information of the Assembly, my understanding is that Epic is the digital health record. It is about patient health records.
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