Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Colin Barnett's Liberals have failed Western Australia on health, and people across my electorate are suffering as a result. Cuts at Armadale Kelmscott Memorial Hospital have seen surgery slots reduced by a third. The hospital has lost a full day of surgery each week, has cut down on the hours surgery is available through the rest of the week and there is not even enough to staff on hand to maintain those reduced hours if any of the staff call in sick.

Local GPs have expressed concerns that their patients cannot access the required services, and I have been told that specialists at the hospital are looking to leave because the working conditions have become so bad. In addition, pressure is being put on clinicians to recategorise patients to meet hospital board's KPIs, which, if done, would put patients' lives at risk.

Armadale hospital previously undertook more obstetric procedures than any other WA hospital of similar size and consistently performed above expectation. Now there is nowhere near as many, and all this when this hospital services the fastest-growing suburbs in Western Australia.

This is a symptom of the Barnett Liberal government's chronic and systemic failure to make patients a priority in the health system. WA Labor's Putting Patients First policy will free up hospital beds and reduce wait times through Medihotels and Urgent Care Clinics. WA's health system needs the fresh approach of a Mark McGowan Labor government, not another four years of Liberal neglect.