Coffs Harbour Base Hospital

Mr FRASER (Coffs Harbour) [5.25 p.m.]: I again bring to the attention of the House - I have
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previously raised this matter with the Minister for Health - the dilemma of the health budget of Coffs Harbour Base Hospital. Last week the budget for Coffs Harbour Base Hospital was finally handed down by the Mid North Coast Area Health Service. The Minister allocated the health budget in Parliament in May and it was then distributed throughout the mid North Coast. It has taken five months to inform Coffs Harbour Base Hospital of an increase in its budget. However, the increase will barely cover a rise in staff wages. In fact, there will be no increase; it will mean a 15 percent cut to hospital services. An article in the local paper, interviewing Dr Philip Houlton of Coffs Harbour Base Hospital, said:

Dr Houlton attended the recent Board meeting held to discuss the budget and said the Board would implement a number of cost-saving strategies from November 1.

These measures include the cessation of all non-urgent surgery for the next nine months, all casual staff would be stood down for the next nine months, an unspecified number of beds would be closed at Coffs Harbour Base Hospital and 10 beds at Macksville, and that waiting lists would be shut down with a line drawn under the last entry from November 1.

"If you have surgery which is not urgent, such as varicose veins, grumbling gall bladder, hernia, hysterectomy, then there are no plans for you to have this done in Coffs Harbour" Dr Houlton said.

What an absolute disgrace! It is an abrogation of the Government’s obligation to the people of Coffs Harbour. An apologist in the form of Mrs Edith Hall, a Labor Party member and now chair of the Mid North Coast Hospital Board, was also interviewed. The article continued:

Mrs Hall said the cost containment strategies were implemented because the health service expenditure had exceeded budget in previous years.

Coffs Harbour Base Hospital was $2.5 million over budget. It had not even made up that shortfall and the level of service it attained last year, having been the most efficient hospital in New South Wales, will have to be reduced. The article continued further:

She said elective surgery would continue but at a reduced level based on priorities determined by doctors.

Level one and two urgent cases will continue and other less urgent cases will be prioritised, Mrs Hall said.

Mrs Hall said no ban had been placed on casual staff and that no beds would be closed, although an area in the maternity unit previously used for non-maternity patients would now be used for medical records storage.

Adding the seven beds from last year, under this Government 11 beds at the Coffs Harbour hospital, in one of the fastest growing areas on the North Coast, have been closed. Yet the Minister for Health says Coffs Harbour is better off - 11 beds are closed and surgery is wiped but he says Coffs Harbour is better off! The Minister is quoted in the Coffs Harbour Advocate as saying that Coffs Harbour is better off. He says that under this Government the budget allocation has increased. The article went on:

As a percentage of the total health service budget across the State, the MNCAHS now receives 24 per cent . . .

If someone tells a half-truth, it is a half-lie. I suggest there is more than a half-lie in what the Minister for Health is telling us. According to the article, Dr Houlton responded by saying:

We have been told to reduce our surgical activity by 20 cases a week, or 80 cases a month . . .

Now our current elective or non-urgent surgery case load is 75 cases a month. Simple maths will tell you that if we are told to cutback by 80 cases a month and we are currently only performing 75 cases a month then there will be no elective surgery . . .

People should understand that if someone has lymphoma, a cancer which is terminal, and needs lymph glands to be taken out, that is classed as elective surgery. Surgery could prolong their lives but because they have terminal cancer it is deemed to be elective. They would be unable to access that sort of operation at Coffs Harbour Base Hospital. That is an absolute disgrace. I have asked the Minister to meet with me and the doctors from Coffs Harbour. I have not heard from him. I sent him an urgent fax. He is not in Parliament today; he does not wish to discuss it. I leave the House with this thought: A hospital committee set out by this Minister has been round the State and the chairman of the committee has said this week that several country hospitals are being held together by the paint on the walls. It is the dust between the paint and the walls that is holding the Coffs Harbour Base Hospital together. Even the cleaners have been sacked. [Time expired.]