Mr McCARTHY - 1997-12-04
Earlier this year, he announced a review of health services for Palmerston and the rural area. The announcement was well received in the rural area that carries the greater population of the area under review. Since the establishment of the review, I have heard nothing of its progress. It was widely believed there would be an opportunity for public input. However, I am not aware of any advertised invitation to contribute to the review. Can the minister advise rural residents of progress of the review? Will there be an opportunity for public input? When does he expect to have results of the review?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I know the member has taken a great interest in the matter in personal representations to me and also in comments in this Assembly in the past week. There is a real concern, and that is evidenced also by the petition I tabled from 3647 residents calling for improved health services in the Palmerston and rural area. We are not trying to ignore it. In fact, we have been very active.
In advance of those representations, I commissioned the KPMG survey in the middle of this year with wide terms of reference. Essentially,
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its task was to determine the minimum baseline service requirements for Palmerston and the rural area now and over the next 10 years. The population of Palmerston is expected to double over the next 10 years from 14 002 people in 1996 to 28 373 in 2005, an increase of 102%. The Darwin rural population is expected to rise by 42.8% from 14 449 to 20 629. That is an incredible growth and the government has a responsibility to ensure that our health service delivery meets that growth.
The draft KPMG report has now been received by my department. The company did advertise in the papers. I am sorry if the local advertisements were missed by some of the members’ constituents, but it certainly did advertise locally, as I insisted it do. I cannot comment on the report at the moment because it needs to be considered in a balanced way. It will take some time to determine how we will progress this issue, and I am not yet in a position to give a considered statement in that regard. I will certainly keep members informed.
It is worth noting, however, that we have injected some $426 000 to meet the additional workload of the Palmerston Community Care Centre over the last 12 months. We have improved existing specialist services, antenatal and postnatal care services and domiciliary visiting services. I expect the report to call for far more resources to be put into this area.
The other great challenge from this report is to bring community expectations in line with the way we deliver health services into the future. As I have said in this House on many occasions, it is not the way we did it in the past. We really have to see Royal Darwin Hospital as the central major hospital in the Darwin, Palmerston and rural areas. We need to improve the community care centre in Palmerston so that it has a greater outreach capability to project our services in the rural area. It is simply not worth pursuing the argument that every cluster of population will have no need to go to Royal Darwin Hospital in the future. That is something that no government could provide.
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ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I know the member has taken a great interest in the matter in personal representations to me and also in comments in this Assembly in the past week. There is a real concern, and that is evidenced also by the petition I tabled from 3647 residents calling for improved health services in the Palmerston and rural area. We are not trying to ignore it. In fact, we have been very active.
In advance of those representations, I commissioned the KPMG survey in the middle of this year with wide terms of reference. Essentially,
Page 73
its task was to determine the minimum baseline service requirements for Palmerston and the rural area now and over the next 10 years. The population of Palmerston is expected to double over the next 10 years from 14 002 people in 1996 to 28 373 in 2005, an increase of 102%. The Darwin rural population is expected to rise by 42.8% from 14 449 to 20 629. That is an incredible growth and the government has a responsibility to ensure that our health service delivery meets that growth.
The draft KPMG report has now been received by my department. The company did advertise in the papers. I am sorry if the local advertisements were missed by some of the members’ constituents, but it certainly did advertise locally, as I insisted it do. I cannot comment on the report at the moment because it needs to be considered in a balanced way. It will take some time to determine how we will progress this issue, and I am not yet in a position to give a considered statement in that regard. I will certainly keep members informed.
It is worth noting, however, that we have injected some $426 000 to meet the additional workload of the Palmerston Community Care Centre over the last 12 months. We have improved existing specialist services, antenatal and postnatal care services and domiciliary visiting services. I expect the report to call for far more resources to be put into this area.
The other great challenge from this report is to bring community expectations in line with the way we deliver health services into the future. As I have said in this House on many occasions, it is not the way we did it in the past. We really have to see Royal Darwin Hospital as the central major hospital in the Darwin, Palmerston and rural areas. We need to improve the community care centre in Palmerston so that it has a greater outreach capability to project our services in the rural area. It is simply not worth pursuing the argument that every cluster of population will have no need to go to Royal Darwin Hospital in the future. That is something that no government could provide.
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Last updated: 09 Aug 2016