House of Assembly Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1) 55 1 Parliament of South Australia House of Assembly published Question Time Women's and Children's Hospital Women's and Children's Hospital Mrs HURN House of Assembly Schubert Women's and Children's Hospital Mrs HURN (Schubert) (14:54): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing. Who selected the sites that would be considered as part of the Jim Hallion review? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain. Leave granted. Mrs HURN House of Assembly Schubert Mrs HURN: The Hallion review only looked at three possible site locations. Did the minister or the Premier select those? Members interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Order! The minister has the call. The Hon. C.J. PICTON House of Assembly Kaurna Minister for Health and Wellbeing The Hon. C.J. PICTON (Kaurna—Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (14:55): We were very clear that we wanted them to look at all the sites in the biomedical precinct that could be considered— Mrs Hurn interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: The member for Schubert is on three warnings. The Hon. C.J. PICTON House of Assembly Kaurna Minister for Health and Wellbeing The Hon. C.J. PICTON: —and that is the work that was undertaken by the review. They undertook that work. They selected the sites— Mrs Hurn interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Member for Schubert! The Hon. C.J. PICTON House of Assembly Kaurna Minister for Health and Wellbeing The Hon. C.J. PICTON: —and you can see the result of that work, which points very clearly to the barracks site that is set further off Port Road. I had the opportunity to brief the Leader of the Opposition and the shadow minister earlier on this, but I am happy to run through it again. There were a variety of different sites that were examined by the review— Mrs Hurn interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Member for Schubert! The Hon. C.J. PICTON House of Assembly Kaurna Minister for Health and Wellbeing The Hon. C.J. PICTON: —firstly looking at the existing triangular site, looking at the current status of that site. We have already traversed the deficiencies of that in terms of the clinical output. The review looked at whether that site could be improved, and that was considered. There was consideration of two different iterations of building upon the city site, and that was the lowest ranked by the clinicians involved in the process. A number of issues were raised with that, including significant issues in terms of ambulance access with the traffic access on that site. What would seem apparent in terms of being able to connect to the Royal Adelaide wasn't actually useful in terms of connecting at the wrong end of the building, so there were a number of issues there. The other alternative that was looked at was considering splitting the hospital, building the women's part of it near the RAH and the children's part on the other side. That would have involved the barracks as well, being required for part of the children's hospital and also the car parking provisions for that hospital. That was considered. That was the most expensive option that was looked at— Mrs Hurn interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: The member for Schubert is on three warnings. The Hon. C.J. PICTON House of Assembly Kaurna Minister for Health and Wellbeing The Hon. C.J. PICTON: —both from a capital perspective and an operational perspective. Mr Whetstone interjecting: The Speaker House of Assembly The SPEAKER: Member for Chaffey! The Hon. C.J. PICTON House of Assembly Kaurna Minister for Health and Wellbeing The Hon. C.J. PICTON: So much of the different sites would have to be duplicated across those two hospitals, so that didn't get significant support in the review. It then looked at the barracks site. The review looked at a site closer to Port Road. There were a number of benefits according to that, including, as we have talked about, the ability to plan for the future in terms of capacity expansion and being able to connect those critical care services on that site. However, the downfall of that initial look that the site review did was that it was too close to Port Road. It would lead to a rebuilding of Port Road, which would have been a very expensive and disruptive proposition to have happen. Then they looked at another alternative, which was to set it further back from Port Road, and that was the outcome that came out of the site review chaired by Jim Hallion. It had the highest overall score, the highest clinical score and the highest construction score of all the projects. That is the work that has informed the decision that we have made to build a hospital that is going to have the ability to have the best clinical outcomes now and into the future.