Modbury Hospital

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (Leader of the Opposition) (14:39): A supplementary arising from the original question: will the minister please outline for the benefit of this chamber the contents of that briefing and what it said about the promise to establish a stand-alone high dependency unit at the Modbury Hospital?

The Hon. S.G. WADE (Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (14:40): The fact of the matter is that there is a range of clinical opinions in relation to Modbury Hospital.

The Hon. K.J. Maher: What does your department say? What's it say? What does your department tell you? That's the question.

The PRESIDENT: Order! Let the minister speak. He is on his feet.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: They were the range of clinical opinions that we took into account in setting our policy.

The Hon. K.J. Maher: What does your department say?

The Hon. S.G. WADE: Sorry, Mr President, I'd like to answer the question.

The PRESIDENT: Let the minister answer, Leader of the Opposition.

The Hon. K.J. Maher interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Leader of the Opposition, let the minister respond to his question.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: The honourable Leader of the Opposition wants to chatter in the background, 'What does the department say? What does the department say?' This is one of the problems of the Labor government: after 16 years, you only listen to the bureaucrats. We got out there, listened to clinicians, not only the clinicians who managed to get successful appointments under the Transforming Health regime, but all clinicians, front line and a whole range of contexts. Also, we have the ongoing willingness to speak to a range of clinicians.

Let me give you some more detail about what happened when I went to Modbury Hospital. I sat down in the room with people who were former clinical ambassadors for Transforming Health. I sat down in the room with people who had publicly criticised Transforming Health in the media and within the health networks and everybody in between, because we do not believe that there is a monochromatic view. We don't believe in just doing what the department says.

This is the appalling arrogance of a government that believes, 'We are a party of the left. The bureaucrats are all on our side. If we just do what the department says, we will all be fine.' That was the hypocrisy that led to the tragedy of Transforming Health. If the honourable Leader of the Opposition, a former minister in a failed government, wants to spend the next four years asking me, 'What did the department say?' I will just say that I will listen to what the people said. The people said they backed our plans to restore services to the north-east after your government, your former government, cut critical services by half to the north-east.