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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-10-14 Daily Xml
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CENTRAL NORTHERN ADELAIDE HEALTH SERVICE

Mr GRIFFITHS (Goyder—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (14:47): My question is to the Treasurer. Given the Minister for Health's response to the question from the member for Morphett, has the Treasurer been advised of a budget blow-out of the Central Northern Health Service? The Treasurer in this house stated on 20 November 2007:

...overall, with our monthly monitoring by Treasury and our quarterly monitoring by ERBCC, we keep a pretty good check on government expenditure.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY (Port Adelaide—Deputy Premier, Treasurer, Minister for Industry and Trade, Minister for Federal/State Relations) (14:47): I am happy to inform the junior shadow minister for finance—

Mr PISONI: Point of order, Mr Speaker: it is disorderly, sir, to address people by other than their title or their constituency.

The SPEAKER: I am not sure it is disorderly but it is the practice of the house that members only be referred to either by their official title or by their electorate. I encourage the Deputy Premier to stick to that practice.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: Mr Speaker, I certainly will follow your lead. I am pleased that the member for Unley—a stickler for probity, truthfulness and authenticity—would jump and rise. What was that old saying? We used to be able to go down to Semaphore jetty and fish for whiting with Twisties on a hook. Throw the hook out. They're up. The line has not even hit the water and then two jumped out. To the deputy leader, and I shall refer also to the shadow minister or junior minister for finance—

Mr PENGILLY: Point of order, Mr Speaker: standing order 123 quite specifically provides that a member is either to be referred to as, in this case, the member for Goyder or the deputy leader—not the junior minister. He is not the junior minister. As I said, he is the deputy leader or the member for Goyder.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: I did.

The SPEAKER: Order! We can sit here for 18 minutes and go backwards and forwards about something which I think is pretty trivial or we can actually get on with question time.

An honourable member interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Perhaps some members can be a little less sensitive and perhaps if the Deputy Premier just sticks to referring to the members by their proper title. The Deputy Premier.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: To the member for Goyder, the deputy leader, all I say is that when I get attacked three mornings a week by Rob Lucas in another place, when I have TV cameras coming to see me—

Mr PISONI: Point of order, Mr Speaker: the question was quite specific. We are having a debate here by the Deputy Premier.

The Hon. M.J. Atkinson: What standing order is that?

The SPEAKER: Order!

Mr PISONI: Relevance.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Perhaps if the Deputy Premier just gets on with his answer.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: This is funny; this is therapeutic!

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: All I am saying is that if Rob Lucas looks like the shadow treasurer, acts like the shadow treasurer, to me he is the shadow treasurer.

The SPEAKER: Order! The Deputy Premier has made his point; if he gets on with the answer, please.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: I think I've made my point. When I came to office as Treasurer of the state, the then health minister (the member for Elizabeth) and I were astonished that the regime in place for monitoring the expenditure of the Department of Health was non-existent. A budget would be set and an appropriation bill would pass the parliament and there would be no further checking until the end of the financial year.

Why was that? Because the division between then treasurer Rob Lucas and then minister for health Dean Brown was such that the treasury department and the Department of Health had no relationship in terms of financial controls. So riven with distrust and hatred was that Liberal cabinet that not only did the most senior minister in health and a most senior cabinet minister, the treasurer, not speak but their departments did not share information.

The SPEAKER: Point of order. The member for MacKillop.

Mr WILLIAMS: This may be of great interest to members of the government, but it has absolutely no relevance to the question that was asked and it is debate. I suggest that it is out of order on at least two counts.

The SPEAKER: Order! No, the explanation was about reports given to the Treasurer on expenditure in the health portfolio and the Treasurer is answering the substance of the question. The Treasurer.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: It is contextual, because when I came to office and there was this incredible—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: I'm getting to it.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for MacKillop will come to order.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: No; as I said, this is quite therapeutic. When we came to office, on advice from Treasury—

Mr Williams interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for MacKillop will come to order.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: The genius that caused Martin's downfall.

Ms Chapman: A hundred million dollars worth of therapy.

The SPEAKER: The member for Bragg!

Mr Williams interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for MacKillop is warned.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: What we did on coming into office was set up monthly reporting of agencies to Treasury as to how they were tracking towards their budget. We have quarterly ERBCC reporting. We have financial accountability of CEOs where they are required to come to me as Treasurer and their minister when we have problems with their budget. Treasury, in the last seven years, has developed a system and a process where we are all over, to the extent that we can be, financial performance of agencies, so that when we see problems early we can put in place either remedial action or make provision for those cost overruns. It is no secret that the costs of health have bedevilled governments for the last decade or two at both state and national level—

Mrs Redmond interjecting:

The SPEAKER: If the Leader of the Opposition wants to ask a question, I would be happy to give her the call.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: Both Labor and Liberal governments—because, without having the facts right in front of me, I think I could confidently say that the health department overspent its budget each and every year of a Liberal government. I do not have that information right in front of me, but my guess would be that that is correct.

With respect to our health budget and what is occurring at present, there is no question that we are struggling to maintain our budgets because of the high demand for patient care. I was on the record as Treasurer following the COAG meeting when there were some treasurers out there publicly, nationally—and some premiers for that matter—saying that they had signed a fantastic deal with the commonwealth government when it came to the commonwealth-state health agreement. I was on the record at the time saying that it was not an outstanding agreement. It was much better than what Howard had given the states, but it was not good enough. The old 50:50 parity between state and commonwealth has not been restored. Howard has taken it down; Labor has lifted it back up, but not far enough.

This is an issue that we can politicise, that is obvious, but it is a problem bedevilling future governments: how do we manage the health budget when it is growing in excess of 9 per cent per annum compounding—a factor of wage inflation, technology development and, as the minister said, ageing? The average person in our new hospital when it is built will be 70 years of age.

These are problems confronting not only this government but every government in the western world. As it relates to the Central Northern Adelaide Health Service, I am advised that the budget is currently between $19 million and $20 million year, to date, over budget. It is not the $100 million as claimed by the opposition. That is the advice I have. The central northern region is going through extensive reform to reduce waste and create efficiencies so that more funding can be invested in services. I come back to this point, that the—

Ms Chapman interjecting:

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: It is difficult to manage a health budget with the incredible demands of an ageing society where technology is being developed almost on a weekly basis to keep—

Mr Williams interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for MacKillop has already been warned once.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: The management of health is the most difficult task that any government, any minister or any chief executive officer could have anywhere in government. And it is not just here; it is in every single state. As far as I am concerned as Treasurer, the minister and his chief executive officer are doing an outstanding job—

Ms Chapman: You wouldn't even know.

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: —of managing what is a very difficult period.

Mr Williams: It's a disgrace.

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: Oh, a disgrace. The member for MacKillop: 'A disgrace.' Let us have a look at the hypocrisy of members opposite. Members opposite want to support the rebuilding of the Adelaide hospital on the current site.

Mr GRIFFITHS: I rise on a point of order, Mr Speaker. My question was specifically about the Central Northern Adelaide Health Service. The Treasurer is now debating other issues.

The SPEAKER: Yes, the Deputy Premier is debating. Have you finished, Deputy Premier?

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: The Royal Adelaide is part of the central health region. The point I am trying to make is that the reason we are building a new hospital, in part, is the efficiencies we can get in operating the hospital as a greenfield site with a whole raft of new ways, new logistics, new technologies, new patient care models and a new configuration of rooms that can bring down the operating costs anywhere from $50 million to $100 million per annum. These people opposite do not want that.

How hypocritical of them to come in here and say, 'What are you doing to manage health pressures?' We are going to build a brand new hospital that could save between $50 million and $100 million a year on operating costs, and these members oppose it. They oppose it, because, when it comes to doing something substantial, having a proper, decent policy going forward, the members opposite are bereft of any. They have no imagination, they have no vision—

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: —they have no concept of government.

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. K.O. FOLEY: You are a lousy lot sitting there in opposition.

The SPEAKER: Order! The Deputy Premier is now debating. The member for Morphett.

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