Rudd promises more bureaucracy, but no real plan, to fix our local hospitals
03-March-2010
The Prime Minister’s solution to fix the problems plaguing our health systems is to put another layer of bureaucracy into the health system. That is not going to fix our health problems, it is going to make them worse.
Labor has been an abject failure in regards to health. Kevin Rudd has failed in his promise to have hospitals “fixed” by the middle of last year. He has failed in his promise to deliver 31 GP Super Clinics. Furthermore, he has twice tried to close the Medicare Chronic Disease Dental Scheme, he has tried to halve Medicare rebates for patients requiring cataract surgery and he is attempting to slash private health insurance rebates.
Instead of delivering any extra frontline health services, Kevin Rudd has delivered an estimated 150 reviews, inquiries, working groups, summits, consultations, audits and discussion papers. It is bureaucracy gone mad, and it is set to get worse under his unfunded plan.
The Rudd Government’s proposed changes will not deliver control of public hospitals to local people - instead we are going to see more and more red tape added to the health system. Kevin Rudd’s plan to centralise bureaucracy in Canberra is not going to improve health outcomes in Dubbo, Mudgee, Narrabri, Moree or anywhere else. The Coalition believes that local communities and local hospitals should have the opportunity to make decisions concerning their own hospitals, as opposed to Mr Rudd’s vision of an army of bureaucrats in Canberra having de facto control of hospitals in regional areas.
What is also clear is that this is a distraction from the insulation fiasco. It is a distraction from the failings of a Government which has promised much on health, and delivered nothing. Kevin Rudd is running this country with a focus on spin and distraction, not on fulfilling the promises he made to people of the Parkes electorate prior to the 2007 election – one of which was to fix our hospitals.