‘Embarrassing clanger’: Premier rubbishes Labor’s hospital jobs cut claims
Fears that a Queensland Health review into satellite hospitals would justify job cuts has been denied by Premier David Crisafulli, who believes services may need to increase.
QLD Politics
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The state government will consider expanding the state’s much maligned satellite hospitals – including adding MRI and CT scanning facilities.
But Premier David Crisafulli has doubled down on his commitment to rename the health centres to prevent confusion.
The premier on Tuesday said staff at the facilities would be bolstered, rubbishing claims by Opposition leader Steven Miles who accused the government of establishing a “secret sham review” which he claimed would be used to justify workforce cuts.
The Courier-Mail has obtained a letter revealing the review was launched by Mr Miles’ former health minister Shannon Fentiman in September, prior state election.
A departmental letter addressed to the Australian Medical Association of Queensland said there would be a “comprehensive evaluation” with consultation to begin early this year.
According to the Queensland Health document the review will scrutinise service models, security risk assessment, and the distribution of workforce and funding resources across the seven satellite hospitals.
The letter said AMAQ would be part of the consultation process if there were impacts on staff.
Mr Crisafulli on Tuesday ruled out any staff cuts or reduction of services at satellite hospitals.
“We have a commitment around what the former government called satellite hospitals … one is to properly name them,” he said.
“The second is to bolster the services that are there, that’s going to take more workers.”
Mr Crisafulli said the review was aimed at increasing capacity.
“We’ve promised to add MRIs and CTS across quite a few of those, and that work is going to be underway, so there will be more staff employed there, but they will be properly named and properly resourced,” he said.
“We want them to have increasing capacity.”
Health Minister Tim Nicholls labelled Mr Miles’s criticism of the review – launched by his government – as an own goal.
“What an embarrassing clanger,” he said.
“Clearly the former Health Minister never told Premier Miles about her secret review and now as Shadow Treasurer she did not stop the Opposition Leader from putting his foot in his mouth.
“The sham here is Steven Miles credibility and weak hold on his own leadership.”
AMAQ president Nick Yim said the medical body had strongly advocated for the satellite hospitals to be co-designed with general practitioners and primary health care providers so that patients were not confused and to avoid the poaching of staff.
“We will work with Queensland Health to provide input to their evaluation of satellite hospitals and use it as an opportunity to share our members’ perspectives on satellite hospitals with the goal of mitigating these risks,” he said.
It was revealed last month that hundreds of thousands of dollars were expected to be spent on changing the names of satellite hospitals, after the majority of 2700 health workers surveyed indicating they should be changed.
Figures showed a total 130,979 minor injury and illness clinic presentations across the satellite hospitals with the exception of Bribie Island between August 2023 and September 2024, and 62,504 outpatient appointments.
The figures were of six of the satellite hospitals, which were Caboolture, Redland, Ripley, Tugun, Kallangur, and Eight Miles Plains.
MINOR INJURY AND ILLNESS CLINIC PRESENTATIONS:
Caboolture: 26,392
Redland: 24,306
Ripley: 31,169
Tugun: 17,213
Kallangur: 23,749
Eight Mile Plains: 8150
OUTPATIENT APPOINTMENTS DELIVERED:
Caboolture: 7850
Redland: 13,280
Ripley: 26,950
Tugun: 6,415
Kallangur: 4116
Eight Mile Plains: 3893
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Clear and present danger: Focus needs to be on saving lives first
The timing of Steven Miles’ cheap political point scoring as he questioned the Premier’s response to the ongoing floods in Townsville is questionable, if not childish, writes the editor. Now is the time to act. Lives are at risk.