MODBURY GP PLUS SUPER CLINIC

Mr HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite) (14:55): My question is to the Minister for Health. Is the Modbury GP Plus Super Clinic still offering full medical services following the withdrawal of the company contracted to provide GP services at this clinic and, if not, when will full services resume? The minister recently announced that this clinic will soon be without permanent GPs until the state government can source a new provider. The opposition has received from the public that patients are being told that, from next Tuesday, there will be only one doctor working at the clinic, and the clinic will only offer GP appointments in the afternoon.

The Hon. J.D. HILL (Kaurna—Minister for Health and Ageing, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Arts) (14:56): I thank the member for—

Mrs Redmond interjecting:

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I thank the—sorry?

Mrs Redmond: I said it's a GP minus, instead of a GP Plus.

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. J.D. HILL: I thank the member for his question. As this was a matter in the media a week or so ago, I could perhaps provide some of the background. The commonwealth government, through the super clinic arrangements, imposes on those who sign up to them certain arrangements, certain requirements. They differ from what we as a state would do in our GP Plus centres. In our GP Plus centres we reach agreement with the local doctors about how we should provide GP services, and we have been able to that successfully at Elizabeth, Aldinga, Woodville and Marion; a different arrangement in each place but, on each occasion, providing service which the communities need.

The commonwealth government, through its arrangements, has said that there ought to be a traditional, if you like, GP clinic placed in the super clinics through the GP Plus Super Clinic at Modbury, and also the one at Noarlunga; we were obliged to sign up to this agreement. We tried to make it work at Modbury, and we entered into agreement with a company called GP Solutions, which provides GP services for us at a range of locations. They found that it did not work for them commercially, and that contract was coming to an end, and I am not sure whether it has already happened—it's probably the end of this week, in fact.

We have said that we would provide interim arrangements, locum services, while we went to the marketplace to see what other providers of services were out there. I am advised by my agency that there are a number of interested parties who now want to be engaged in providing services there. I have also said to my agency, 'Let's think about, in a stronger way, what the communities—and that includes the local GPs—would want to see,' and I have made representations to the commonwealth about varying the contractual arrangements we have with them so that we can get a system in place that makes sense to that local community. Our undertaking is to ensure that there are GP services there.

Can I say that, since the service has been open—which is about a year now—more than 7,500 patients have been seen by the GPs, so it is clearly providing a valuable service, and more than 3,000 patients also use the public allied health services in the clinic. So, we are at a transition stage between what was tried, and we are now looking at what will work better.