Grievance Debate

SA Ambulance Service Resourcing

Mr MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Leader of the Opposition) (15:24): Politics is a funny business. It tends to inevitably focus on points of difference rather than things we have in common. Truth be told, amongst all of us who work together in this chamber, we probably have more that we agree upon than what we disagree upon. But it is also true that as we approach the election, South Australians do want to know who they are choosing between, what are the differences in value systems, what are the differences in priorities that exist between various candidates and the major political parties and their leaders.

It is a reality that those points of difference are magnified and often arguably gain more attention than is necessarily the case in terms of how big the differences are. But I do think today in the parliament we have seen a pretty good illustration of the things that are different between the Australian Labor Party and the Liberal Party of South Australia in terms of our priorities and our values.

We were out on the steps before question time listening to real people, who I do not imagine are particularly political, sharing their real-life stories about what ambulance ramping and the under-resourcing of the Ambulance Service have meant to them. We heard a tragic story about a gentleman losing his life while they were waiting for an ambulance. We heard the story of the Strathalbyn pub owner who has been utterly exasperated while waiting for an ambulance on more than one occasion, now finding themselves acting as a quasi-paramedic while they are sitting around waiting for a countless period of time for an ambulance to show up, when they are supposed to be running their pub.

Those ambulance officers came into the chamber to listen to question time and what they heard was the opposition asking questions of the government and then a pretty stock standard response from the Premier, a recitation of facts—selective facts—without actually acknowledging the real issue here, and that is that he has the power to change it. Reciting statistics, which act as a shield or a defence for the government's political problems, does not do justice to the power and authority that is vested in the Premier of the state.

At any moment, the Premier could pick up the phone, he could call his Treasurer and say, 'The Ambulance Service needs more resources. I want it to be delivered today.' Instead of doing that, what we see is the Premier on the phone to the Treasurer, presumably talking about resources for a television advertising campaign that we learnt today is in the order of $1 million. I cannot begin to imagine how far that $1 million could go to, let's say, covering ambulance officers at Strathalbyn, where we were hearing those stories from today, or ambulance officers anywhere else across regional South Australia we know are in particularly acute need, as well as metropolitan ambulance officers, which speaks to priorities.

Another thing that came up on the steps of parliament today was, 'What is the government's priority when it announces a $600 million basketball stadium rather than investing more resources in a health system that is in unprecedented crisis?' We have learned today, as a result of the government slipping out statistics on Monday when they also released more details around their so-called road map, they were actually also releasing details about ambulance ramping that show that it is over 550 per cent worse than what it was in 2017.

So at the election the Premier of the state is going to say, 'In response to your concerns around the hospital crisis, I need you to vote for me for one more term,' but South Australians would know that runs the risk of yet another 500 per cent increase in ramping over the course of a four-year period. It means that again the Premier might see the first two years in office delivering an $11 million cut to an ambulance service. It may yet mean more corporate liquidators in charge of our health system rather than nurses and doctors who actually know how to deliver patient care.

The gall that it must take for members of the Liberal Party to run around in their electorates and say, 'Thank you to nurses, thank you to ambulance officers, thank you to our emergency workers who have done us all so proud during the course of COVID. We really want to thank you, and we've got a special Christmas present for you to acknowledge that thanks: it's a pay cut on Christmas Eve.' The Liberal Party's thanks to all these workers—who are doing it tough, dealing with an unprecedented crisis, both in terms of ramping and in terms of COVID—is to cut their pay.

If you ever wanted a point of difference between the Marshall Liberal government and a potential Malinauskas Labor government it is right there, because we will not do a basketball stadium: we will invest in health. With all those people out there serving us on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, we are not going to turn our back on them: we are going to make sure they get the pay that they deserve.