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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, First Session (54-1)
2019-10-16 Daily Xml
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KordaMentha

The Hon. T.T. NGO (15:16): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing. How can the minister claim that KordaMentha, corporate liquidators, have been a success when the minister has overspent the health budget by a record $476 million in one year, according to the Auditor-General?

The Hon. S.G. WADE (Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (15:16): I am gobsmacked. I am impressed that we managed to get a new question rather than repeat the same question. Yesterday, we had a repeat of one from the previous week, so at least I congratulate the honourable member on the staff providing him with a fresh question. This morning, the ICAC commissioner today backed the government's engagement of KordaMentha.

Yesterday, we had the opposition continuing its campaign against KordaMentha in response to progress they had made in relation to coding. This morning we had the ICAC commissioner highlighting the maladministration that has been endemic in SA Health for years, and stating that KordaMentha was an important part of dealing with that maladministration, yet the opposition comes in and wants to have another punch at KordaMentha.

The fact of the matter is that the result of Labor's legacy has been mismanagement in the health system, with CALHN overspending by $5 million each week at the time of KordaMentha's engagement. In light of the significant issues within CALHN, KordaMentha's engagement was important financially and organisationally to turn around this toxic culture.

As I said to the Hon. Frank Pangallo earlier today, the KordaMentha appointment was in the context of our awareness of the level of maladministration. One of the very clear themes of the KordaMentha report is that financial and organisational recovery is significantly related to culture, and culture, whether compliance with procurement policies, whether maintaining proper registration and record keeping, as highlighted by the ICAC commissioner today, is such that you cannot run a healthy, efficient health service without a strong administration and strong policies.

The government appointed a new board for CALHN and a new CEO, Lesley Dwyer, and KordaMentha has been working with them to address the significant organisational and financial issues that Labor left behind. In that context, I would remind the house that the KordaMentha target for the first year, in terms of savings, was $41 million. My recollection is that the outcome was actually $57 million. In other words, they exceeded their KPI by $16 million.

There are significant challenges that lay before the health portfolio, and in particular the Central Adelaide Local Health Network. The engagement of KordaMentha is not only helping us renew the culture of SA Health and deal with maladministration but it is also supporting the financial recovery of the health system, and we will not take a lecture from Labor, which gave us 16 years of mismanagement and now criticises us when we are trying to recover from that.

The Hon. K.J. Maher interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Just because the time for question time has expired does not mean private conversations. You can leave the chamber if you wish and have a private conversation outside.

The Hon. K.J. Maher interjecting:

The PRESIDENT: Leader of the Opposition, I just gave you that reminder. The President is about to speak. I now call on members to make statements on Matters of Interest, the time allowed being 35 minutes, each member being allowed to speak for no longer than five minutes.

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