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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-05-02 Daily Xml
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Grievance Debate

Ambulance Ramping

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS (Black—Leader of the Opposition) (15:14): Today, I rise to talk about priorities because over the Easter break we learnt a great deal about the government's priorities, and it was a significant change from the priorities they put forth to the South Australian people in the lead-up to the March 2022 state election.

The priorities back then—we remember them well—were all about health, and particularly all about hospital ramping. We remember the posters plastered across lampposts and Stobie poles right across highways and streets in South Australia: 'We will fix the ramping crisis.' Since then—and we have seen it in recent weeks—there has been a significant definitional change on what that promise was. There is not just one asterisk now; there are several asterisks around time frames and levels and response times replacing what ramping was actually thought to be in the minds of South Australians.

Since the election, since that time, we have seen such a change of tune from our Premier here in South Australia. In the lead-up to the election all he wanted to talk about was ramping and fixing the ramping crisis, the presence of ambulances on the hospital ramp. Today, the stats are so many times worse than they were back then in February 2022, the last recorded statistical period of hospital ramping prior to the change of government.

The change is so stark now. Back then we saw just over 1,000 hours spent on the ramp but now, in March 2023, it is 3,968 hours—a 162 per cent increase in ramping compared to March 2022. In fact, we have now seen ramping spread from the major hospitals—the Lyell McEwin, the Royal Adelaide Hospital and Flinders Medical Centre—into the suburban hospitals: Noarlunga Hospital, Modbury Hospital, The Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

The situation confronting patients and paramedics gets worse and worse, but the Premier is now, 'Look over here, look at the Gather Round, look at LIV Golf.' These are things that, by themselves, do contribute to the state's economy, things that in some ways we might celebrate, but not when the single most important election commitment, the primary election commitment put forward by the Malinauskas Labor government, was to fix the ramping crisis.

It is not just the ramping crisis now; we now have the 'pillow crisis' as well. In the most bizarre failure of hospital management I can remember in recent times, our hospitals are running out of pillows. A few weeks ago we had the 93-year-old man whose family had to find him a pillow and linen in the hospital emergency department, and just in the last couple of days it has been exposed that a four year old transported to hospital with a suspected twisted bowel, writhing in pain, was provided with a towel to rest his head on after a 20-minute search by a nurse came back with absolutely no pillows to be found.

What is going on with our hospital system, with the smoke and mirrors, the change of definitions? Today, we had the Minister for Health say that this is not a problem, that it was the nurse's fault because she could not find a pillow, that she was not looking in the right place, that he went down there today and saw a pile of pillows sitting somewhere. It is unbelievable the denial, the change of stories, the smoke and mirrors. Just fess up to the problem, take responsibility and fix it, Chris. We used to have Fix it Pat or Fix it Ian, now we have Fix it Chris.

The Premier no longer visits hospital emergency departments. There are no more selfie videos on the ramp; that has all ended now. Today, and in recent times, it has been speeches in the centre of footy ovals and it has been events under the shadow of the Saudi flag. Let me tell you that it is not just the opposition and the South Australian public who are concerned. According to the radio yesterday morning it was quite clear that several members of his backbench are very concerned as well. This government are all about the fellas, all about the boys. They have no interest whatsoever. Their blokey culture—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —is not delivering for the people of South Australia—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —and instead of looking—

The SPEAKER: Order! Leader, your time has expired.

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —for ways to entertain the boys—

The SPEAKER: Leader, your time has expired.

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —how about you go and find some pillows and create a bit of comfort for the poor—

The SPEAKER: Leader, please be seated!

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —four-year-old who suffered at the hands—

The SPEAKER: Be seated, leader, your time has long since expired!

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: —of your negligence.

The SPEAKER: The member for Badcoe has the call.

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