Grievance Debate

Hospital Beds

Mr MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Leader of the Opposition) (15:29): What a week, what a week! This week we really have seen the Liberal Party outdo themselves. I have to say that if it was not so tragic it would be funny. It would be funny. I have been somewhat struck over the last 48 hours how much this has cut through.

I have had the pleasure of attending a number of business events in recent times, including yesterday evening the launch of the 2022 Downer-Rann Scholarships, an important event for the state and an event the Premier himself was billed to attend and speak at. I was somewhat surprised yesterday to attend the scholarships for this particular award only to find out that the Premier was a late withdrawal. Apparently, it was a late withdrawal. The explanation given by the MC at this particular event was that the Premier was occupied with important parliamentary business.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Point of order, sir: standing order 131.

Mr Malinauskas: Is that 'Don't CRACK jokes at the Premier's and the Liberal Party's expense'?

The SPEAKER: I will hear the member in relation to any submissions he wishes to put in relation to 131. I anticipate he is drawing my attention to interruptions.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: In addition to the member for Cheltenham interrupting the Speaker just then, many members have been rudely interrupting their leader's speech and I look forward to them being drawn to order.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! There are a robust number of interjections in the house.

Mr MALINAUSKAS: The Downer-Rann Scholarship launch 2022: Premier Steven Marshall attending the event—had to withdraw because of important parliamentary business. The irony of this, of course, was that earlier in the day during the course of question time we had the Premier wax lyrical about earlier events where premiers have had to withdraw as a result of stability. The irony is not lost on us.

What all of this is a function of is a government that is imploding, a government that is desperate. What we see at the moment is the Premier fully revealed for the dilettante of a leader that he is. The desperation is so substantial—

The SPEAKER: Leader, please be seated. There is a point of order.

The Hon. J.A.W. GARDNER: Point of order: personal reflections on a member are unparliamentary.

The SPEAKER: They have to be raised by the member concerned, but I will ask the leader to keep in mind that standing order.

Mr MALINAUSKAS: I am happy to—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Mr MALINAUSKAS: In anticipation of the Premier potentially expressing offence at being characterised as a dilettante—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Members will not engage in discussion between themselves.

Mr MALINAUSKAS: —I am happy to recharacterise and to remind South Australians that we do not have a Premier in charge of his own party at the moment, let alone the people of South Australia and its government.

All jokes aside—and we could go on—there are some important matters of state that the Premier should be focused on, and nothing is more important at the moment than getting our health system ready for COVID. That is an exercise that should not be starting now: that is an exercise that should have started 20 months ago.

We cast our minds back to when COVID first started emerging, and in this very place the Premier quite rightly identified that the policy at that point in time for governments—not just in South Australia or Australia but around the world—was to make sure that we flattened the curve and pushed out the peak. The whole underpinning principle behind that policy was getting our health system ready for COVID because we knew eventually it was going to come.

It is tragic that there is almost an inevitability now that COVID is coming to South Australia. The Premier is wholly committed to opening up the borders before Christmas, which is why the health system has to be ready. Yet as we speak, right at this moment, on the verge of COVID coming to this state, as a matter of policy as at 1pm today—a matter of 2½ hours ago—we have 95 people stuck in emergency departments who should be admitted but cannot be admitted. They cannot be admitted because the hospital system cannot cope with demand that is low, let alone if demand is high, and that is a grave concern.

The government today, in a desperate attempt to take away the attention from its own incapacity to govern, rolled out an announcement of 93 new beds. The unfortunate thing about that number is that 93 new beds is less than half the number of beds they have closed this year—188 beds have been closed by the Marshall Liberal government this year that were set up in preparedness and readiness for COVID itself.

Last year, we had the Wakefield Hospital or the College Grove announcement about this government getting ready for COVID: 'We are investing in special beds to be able to accommodate the demand because of COVID,' 188 beds worth. Fast-forward to 2021: 'They are no longer needed,' cut, gone. Yet here we are now, on the verge of COVID coming into our state, and we are down those 118 beds. Instead, we get an announcement of 93 beds coming. In the course of the last hour, in the other place we have learned, 'By the way, not all those 93 beds are going to be ready until potentially January next year,' after the borders are supposed to be open.

The plan for new beds from this government in preparation for COVID looks something like this: close 188 beds, rush out an announcement of 93 beds, open the border and then after that sometime those beds will be ready. What a joke! This is a serious illness. This is something that this government have had bipartisan support to work with us on and they have not done the one job that this Premier is responsible for—and that is getting our health system ready.

Time expired.