Question Time

Health Services

The Hon. K.J. MAHER (Leader of the Opposition) (14:18): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Health and Wellbeing a question.

Leave granted.

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: The Minister for Health and Wellbeing has now had 48 hours to reflect on the answers he provided in this chamber in question time on Tuesday. He has had counselling from his colleagues about his poor choice of answers and he has had to, embarrassingly, come into this place already to correct the record once.

The PRESIDENT: Be careful; supposition, Leader of the Opposition.

The Hon. K.J. MAHER: My question is: does the minister stand by his comments from Tuesday that he would not rule out privatising hospitals, hospital services and clinical services, or will the minister admit that he misled parliament more than once on Tuesday?

The Hon. S.G. WADE (Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (14:19): I think the simplest way to respond to this is to say what we said clearly on the record to the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation in January 2018, and I stand by this statement:

A Marshall Liberal government would not sell any public hospitals, nor would we move to have any public hospitals privately managed. The Labor Party has sourced a wide range of services from beyond the public sector. In assessing such options, the Liberal Party will be focused on health outcomes.