Health Budget

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (14:51): A further question to the Minister for Health. Can the minister guarantee that as at 30 June 2016, there will be no fewer nurse FTEs employed than as at 30 June 2015?

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING (Playford—Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Arts, Minister for Health Industries) (14:51): All I can guarantee is that under the enterprise agreement we have with the Nurses Federation, we have to staff our hospital beds with a certain number of nurses, so for every hospital bed there is a certain number of nursing staff that we have to have. I do hope that we don't have activity levels at the same levels that we did last year because I do hope that we don't have as terrible a flu season this year as we had last year. If activity levels are down, we won't need as many beds, and we won't need as many staff in those beds, but as long as those beds are open we will make sure that they are staffed accordingly.