Grievance Debate

HEALTH BUDGET

Mr WILLIAMS (MacKillop—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (15:28): There was an interesting performance by the Minister for Education today. Apparently in a press conference just before question time he was asked whether he backs the current leadership team of the government, the Premier and Deputy Premier, and he answered, 'Caucus has made a decision and I have to respect that decision.' That was a rousing endorsement.

I bring this to the attention of the house because we have a government in distress, and this is possibly one of the reasons why we have a government making dumb decisions. The minister today avoided going out to see the reaction from the communities which he seeks to destroy by withdrawing a paltry sum of money, yet the reality is that his health budget is going to suffer from the dumb decisions that he has been making. I will come to that in a moment.

It also came to my attention that our Premier (the twitterer) twittered recently that he actually had a meal in Keith. Returning from Penola on the 17^thafter the canonisation of St Mary, the Premier apparently stopped in Keith to have a steak sandwich and chips, and he twittered that he was there so the world would know that he was in Keith. This is the Premier who, after the election that he lost, said, 'My ministers need to reconnect with the people. I've instructed that they go out and doorknock.'

This is the Premier who stopped in Keith to have a meal but who did not have the courtesy to ring up the chair of the local hospital board and say, 'I've got something for you. I'm in your town today. I understand that you guys are stressing over what my government is doing to your local hospital. Can I have 10 minutes of your time?' That is what the Premier would have done if he knew anything about connecting with the communities in South Australia.

This is the Premier who stands up and makes believe that he is governing for the whole of South Australia. The Minister for Health is disingenuous when he says, 'We are increasing the amount of money we are putting into country health.' He is disingenuous because, for eight years in a row, in real terms he has cut the amount of money that has gone into country health. Country hospitals are suffering right across the board.

He is also disingenuous when he says, 'We are providing for three public hospital beds in the Keith Hospital, but we are only getting a part of that service back because, on average, we have only one bed occupied.' What the minister does not tell the people of South Australia when he is making those statements is that, on average, 5½ beds at the Keith Hospital are occupied. The fact is that most of those people pay for those beds through their private health insurance.

It is disingenuous of the minister not to acknowledge that, if that hospital closes, every one of those patients will end up in the public health system—every one of them. In the budget that this government handed down a few weeks ago (months late), one of the minister's performance targets for country health is to drive the rate of private patients in country hospitals to 16 per cent.

The budget also shows that it dropped from 11.9 per cent to 11.3 per cent in the last 12 months. The minister's strategy of getting more private patients contributing to his health budget is not working: it is going backwards. I can tell the house that 80 per cent plus of the people who go to the Keith and District Hospital use private health. At the end of next June—and do not be mistaken by this minister—that hospital will close.

One of the things that the board cannot do—and will not do, obviously—is to trade insolvent. That is what will happen when the government withdraws this paltry sum. That hospital will close. There will be no accident and emergency service purchased for $300,000 because there will be no doctors in that community and there will be no hospital to service it from. It will cost a fortune to provide an accident and emergency service along the Dukes Highway and the Riddoch Highway.

Minister, we heard about volunteers today. Do not think that volunteers are going to man ambulances along hundreds of kilometres of that road when there is no hospital to take road trauma victims to. You are asking volunteers to go out and pick up road victims off the road with nowhere to take them. Give us a break. It is not going to happen. Every one of those people in that community—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, member for MacKillop.

Mr WILLIAMS: —will end up being your responsibility, minister, and you know it.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, your time has expired.

Mr WILLIAMS: It is a great pity, Madam Deputy Speaker.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Your time has expired.

Mr Venning interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: His time has expired. I mean, it is not as if we couldn't hear him; he was shouting. The member for Ashford.