Proton Therapy in South Australia

Mrs HURN (Schubert) (14:44): My question is again to the Treasurer. Has the Treasurer sought assistance from the federal government to find a solution to ensure proton therapy cancer treatment can be delivered in South Australia? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

Mrs HURN: It was reported in The Advertiser today that Ms Tuckerman was frustrated that calls by the Bragg proton centre consumer group, including to the federal health minister Mark Butler, had fallen on deaf ears, quoting, 'We've literally got crickets.'

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee—Treasurer, Minister for Defence and Space Industries, Minister for Police) (14:44): I thank the member for Schubert for her question. In fact, Ms Tuckerman has corresponded with me directly and I have responded to her to try to indicate the efforts that are being pursued in order to continue this as a potentially successful initiative for South Australia.

I don't think it is reasonable at this point in time to say that the commonwealth hasn't delivered funding when it should have or that it was in a position to. As I have articulated in my previous answers, we still haven't comfortably resolved these technical and engineering challenges about getting the building fit for purpose to be able to accommodate another supplier's proton therapy equipment. We think that that is feasible but we have to do this detailed engineering work to prove that up. Then, of course, on the basis that that is possible—that is the expert engineering advice that we get—then we would need to go to market with, I guess, international proton therapy unit suppliers who we feel more comfortable can deliver against a future contractual obligation to deliver, commission and then maintain this unit in South Australia for the benefit of the community.

We have certainly been briefing federal health officials. The minister and I have met with federal Minister Butler, bearing in mind that this is federal money, granted—albeit in 2017—by the commonwealth health department. They have, of course, a right to know what has been happening with the money that they made available, via the South Australian government, for SAHMRI for the proton therapy initiative. We have been keeping them up to speed with what is required.

We have also tried to provide an understanding of what would be required in the event that it is feasible to get a proton therapy unit in the basement of this building, what is likely to be required in terms of time, indicative cost, as well as the need to create that MBS item number, and for them —this is not something that we can necessarily do at a state level—to identify the cost or fee for that item number, and be committed to paying it.

What we have done as a state, though, is to ask the commonwealth for their endorsement for us to use some of those unspent project funds to keep the project team together. That is not just the project team within SAHMRI, but there is a clinical team led by Adelaide's leading paediatric oncologists who have been working to assist the project and also managing the MTOP—I hope I get this right, the Medical Treatment Overseas Program—which coordinates the overseas cancer treatment for patients who are deemed by the clinicians to be suitable candidates for a proton therapy treatment.

The article that was in the paper today about Ms Tuckerman and her child's journey overseas, in having to go to the United States for this treatment, is exactly what MTOP provides. We have sought the approval of the commonwealth to continue using some of the unspent project balances to keep that program going. That means other children, who are suitable candidates for this proton therapy treatment, will still get access to the treatment albeit having to fly overseas for it.