Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

Prime Minister Rudd and Minister Roxon were in their attire posing for photographs next to hospital beds. Finally we got the blue book, which was released in March 2010. Before COAG we got the sales pitch, which was contained in the green book. The interesting thing about such books is the variation between the blue book, the green book and finally the red book, which was the document that was released at the time of COAG. Even before the ink was dry on the COAG agreement, this government had lined up its television advertising campaign. Nobody had seen the advertisements but this government had already lined up the $25 million it was going to spend trying to convince the Australian public of what it was trying to do. After that we got the National Health and Hospitals Network Agreement, which was much lauded and much trumpeted as a major reform. When you read the nitty-gritty of this agreement, you will see the absolute fabrication and lie that this government has perpetrated on the Australian public.

It talked about federal funding: the new era of federal funding. The ink was barely dry on this document when the national funding authority, which was much trumpeted as the vital mechanism for transparency that would make sure that the state governments used moneys that were directed for health for the appropriate purposes, was dumped unceremoniously. Most cynically it was dumped on the evening of the press gallery ball—slipped into an answer to a question on notice, through the Prime Minister’s department and the Prime Minister’s office. Minister Roxon was left standing there, not really knowing what was going on, telling journalists, ‘Oh, you had better ask the Prime Minister about that one.’ Here we had a major platform of this so-called reform being dumped unceremoniously—‘No, we don’t need pricing transparency anymore’—after they had spent months telling us how important this was.

The other misconception, the other lie that has been perpetrated, has been the falsehood about the networks being run locally. I have traversed this issue before. In this document it is very clear that the clinical expertise on these local hospital networks will not come from the local area; it will come from outside the local area. What is the point of having a local hospital network when the clinical expertise, those doctors who should know about that area, is not going to be appointed to those boards? This is all about maintaining the status quo, trying to portray some sort of national grand plan that is now well and truly falling apart. It faces sure extinction. The question I want answered is: what has been the cost to taxpayers of all the reviews, meetings and photo opportunities—all that stuff? What another instance of disgraceful Labor waste. The grand plan will be confined to terminal waste. It was never a legally binding agreement. It was more about giving us bureaucrats but no doctors and nurses.