Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Boyce made some very valuable points in her contribution to this debate on the National Health Reform Amendment (National Health Performance Authority) Bill, as did Senator Fierravanti-Wells earlier, on behalf of the coalition. I will just indicate my concern about the way that health is going. I am no great expert, I have to confess to the Senate, on health performance and health reform. I have, however, recently had a relative who has been hospitalised in both public and private hospitals. In visiting that relative, some things have become quite clear. One of those things, particularly in the public hospitals in Queensland, is that there is a clear indication of understaffing of people who are actually involved in the health care of patients. Every time I go to a hospital—fortunately, those visits are a couple of years apart—there seems to be more and more bureaucracy and fewer and fewer nurses and even doctors on the floor.

I am concerned, as the previous speaker mentioned, that this new authority seems to have no particular power. The nation would be better off if we put the $109.5 million that this authority is going to cost into better conditions or perhaps into additional numbers of people who are working on the floor and helping people with their health problems. As the previous speaker mentioned: what is this new authority going to do to improve performance? The best people to determine how to improve performance are those who are actually performing. My association with these people suggests that their concern about performance comes from the long hours they are expected to work. I am talking about hospitals in Queensland—some in major capital cities and some in small country towns.

Madam Acting Deputy President, can I use this debate to congratulate those who do provide that service in hospitals throughout Queensland and, I guess, throughout Australia, although I have no experience there. They do a fabulous job. It is just that they seem to be continually overworked. They are trying to look after too many patients, and at times patients are in the position where they feel they are not being well enough looked after. My experience, and again it is only anecdotal, is that all of those working in health care in the hospitals that I visited in Queensland are doing an absolutely fabulous job. They deserve every piece of congratulation and support we can give them. Setting up another $110 million authority of pen-pushers and bureaucrats makes me wonder how that is going to improve performance.

I understand that a lot of what this authority is going to do will depend on getting accurate performance data from NGOs, and I think the legislation actually says that. I wonder who these NGOs are. Could it be that the NGOs—non-government organisations—are associations like the Health Services Union? The Health Services Union would normally fit under the category of a non-government organisation, but we read in the paper, following the Craig Thomson affair, that it is really a dumping ground for Labor Party wannabes or would-bes. We learn that if you want to get a senior position in the Health Services Union you have to be a member of the Australian Labor Party. That union has been involved with the Australian Labor Party for quite some time, but we read in the papers that suddenly, and against the wishes of the general secretary, a meeting was held—quickly convened—which then disaffiliated the Health Services Union from the Australian Labor Party. I read in the paper that this is all about payback for Senator Feeney. I do not know whether this is true; I do not know enough about the Australian Labor Party's internal affairs. I do know that Senator Feeney was one of those who plotted against the former Prime Minister, Mr Rudd, and installed the current Prime Minister, Ms Gillard. Is this a payback for Senator Feeney from those who supported Mr Rudd? I do not know. I do not pretend to even remotely understand—or, I might say, care—about what happens in the Australian Labor Party, but I found Senator Feeney not a bad sort of fellow.