House of Assembly: Tuesday, March 03, 2009

Contents

ROYAL ADELAIDE HOSPITAL

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (15:04): My question is to the Treasurer. How do the government costings for a rebuild of the Royal Adelaide Hospital include $903 million in escalation costs—almost half the total project cost—and will the Treasurer release the financial basis and business case documents to substantiate those calculations?

The Hon. J.D. HILL (Kaurna—Minister for Health, Minister for the Southern Suburbs, Minister Assisting the Premier in the Arts) (15:05): I have already, in essence, answered this question for the house before. I said two things. One was that there is an escalation cost, and I said I thought it was about 6 per cent a year. That is based on building industry standard calculations and it has been assessed by both our internal advisers, including—

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. J.D. HILL: What documents?

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. J.D. HILL: 'Release the documents': what does that mean? We have costed this within the health system. I have already said—

Mr Williams interjecting:

The Hon. J.D. HILL: Mitch, just cool down. I have already said to the leader and the deputy leader that I am happy to give them a briefing where we go through our costings. Presumably, the leader has a copy of a document that I released at a meeting with some other doctors the other day. So, I am happy for them to have a copy of that and we can go through it with them. But what I say to the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition is that you have said categorically—your policy position—that you will build a new hospital on the existing RAH site. Tell the public of this state how you will do it, how much it will cost, how much capacity will be in it and when you will finish, because after you answer those questions your line of questioning has no credibility whatsoever.