Modbury Hospital

Mr MARSHALL (Dunstan—Leader of the Opposition) (14:35): Can the minister confirm to the house that SA Health staff have advised staff at the Modbury Hospital that there will be a reduction in the number of medical department inpatient beds from the current 48 down to an 18-bed acute assessment unit?

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING (Playford—Minister for Health, Minister for the Arts, Minister for Health Industries) (14:36): Obviously, we have released information to clinicians as part of our consultation with these quite sweeping changes to our health system, not only in northern Adelaide but across metropolitan Adelaide. Obviously, with a changed profile for the Modbury Hospital there will be different workforce and bed needs. What I can assure the house is that, overall, in northern Adelaide there will be more doctors, more nurses and more hospital beds. But I do caution the house. We do have to change the rhetoric around health. We do have to stop talking about inputs as if they are good, in and of themselves.

The health system is not defined by how many doctors, how many nurses and how many hospital beds. What it is defined by is its outputs: the results for patients. How long they spend waiting for elective surgery. How long they wait in emergency departments. What are their outcomes when they are discharged from hospital? We need to stop talking about, and the health debate being framed around, inputs and start framing the health debate around outputs. On any measure, South Australia spends more, and has more doctors, more nurses and more hospital beds than anywhere else in Australia. But what we don't do, where we don't match that, is in the results.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING: We have people waiting longer for elective surgery. We have, in many cases, far higher mortality—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING: —and we also have longer waits in our emergency departments. Yes, I put my hand up. Yes, this is something we are trying to fix; but we're not necessarily going to fix that just by employing more doctors, employing more nurses and putting in more hospital beds because to date—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING: To date that hasn't worked. That hasn't worked. We need to transform our system to make sure that our outputs match what taxpayers are spending on the system to make sure people spend less time in emergency departments, to make sure they spend less time waiting for elective surgery and make sure that they are less likely to have a bad outcome, a poor outcome, when they are discharged from hospital.

I know the line of questioning the Leader of the Opposition is going to pursue in this, and I know he is going to be talking about how many doctors, how many nurses, and so on. But the Leader of the Opposition, only several weeks ago, said that we spend more than enough on the health system. The fact is we have to do it better. So, it would be nice for the Leader of the Opposition, for his actions to reflect—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING: For his actions to reflect his rhetoric, and actually take a more bipartisan and cooperative approach rather than just talking constantly about inputs.

The SPEAKER: The member for Chaffey and the member for Davenport are warned for the second and final time. The member for Hartley will leave under the sessional order for repeatedly interjecting—and for the full hour for interjecting 'less hospitals' when he should have interjected 'fewer hospitals'.

The honourable member for Hartley having withdrawn from the chamber: