KEITH AND DISTRICT HOSPITAL

Dr McFETRIDGE (Morphett) (14:37): My question is to the Minister for Health. The Keith Hospital board has said that, if the government proceeds with their budget cuts, the Keith Hospital will close by 30 June 2011. Is the minister saying the board is wrong or is this just another example of what the Treasurer said yesterday about the ambulance officers' pay errors—and I am quoting the Treasurer—'shit happens'?

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. P.F. CONLON: Point of order, Madam Speaker. If the member wishes to explain the question, he has to seek leave of the house and he may not contain comment, particularly inflammatory comment. I do point out that they cannot then ask the minister not to debate a question when it is couched like that. They have no regard for standing orders.

The SPEAKER: Yes, I uphold that. There was a considerable amount of debate in that, member for Morphett, and you should have known better. However, we will ask the Minister for Health to respond.

The Hon. J.D. HILL (Kaurna—Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Southern Suburbs, Minister Assisting the Premier in the Arts) (14:38): I have had a couple of meetings with representatives of the Keith Hospital board over the years. The most recent was the middle of this year which the member for MacKillop organised and, at that meeting, the representatives of the board told me they would have to close unless we gave them additional money to the money that we are already giving them. So to make the claim that the announcement we made the other day would be the cause of the hospital closing, I think is a false one.

Ms Chapman interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order, member for Bragg!

The Hon. J.D. HILL: The point I was making was that I met representatives of the Keith board some months ago. They told me at the time that, unless the government was able to give them additional money to the money which we were already then giving them (the $600,000, or whatever it is, a year), then they would have to close, because they made the point to me that their finances were unsustainable, and that was the result of a range of factors which I will not necessarily going to unless I am asked, but that is what they told me.

So you can't say that it is going to close because of an announcement I made during the budget, because they already told me that that was going to be the consequence of the circumstances in which they were, so I have said to them, 'We are happy to work through with you to try to help you make your system sustainable.' We are offering to pay them $300,000 a year to look after about 600 emergency patients a year—that is about two patients a day, that works out to about $500 a patient, plus $70,000 we give to the GP to be on-call to provide that service—so we think that is quite a generous amount to look after emergency patients.