AMBULANCE RAMPING
973. Mr Z.R.F. KIRKUP to the Premier:
Mr Speaker —
Ms S.E. Winton interjected.
The SPEAKER: Member for Wanneroo! I call you to order
for the first time.
Mr Z.R.F. KIRKUP: I refer to
record ambulance ramping in Western Australia for the third month in a row. Why
has this government continued to fail the
people of Western Australia by not addressing one of the most fundamental
and critically important service delivery areas for which this government is
responsible?
Mr M.
McGOWAN replied:
As I said when asked this question
before, obviously our hospitals are coping with three things. Firstly, there is
a backlog of elective surgery. We closed down elective surgery for months on
end, so there is a huge backlog that has our hospitals performing at over 100 per
cent when it comes to elective surgery. Dealing with that actually fills beds
in the hospitals and that, obviously, puts stress on the system, if you like.
Secondly, inside our emergency departments,
there are two streams. There are people who have respiratory conditions and
there are people who have non-respiratory conditions. That is slowing
down the activity within emergency departments, and that is, of course, another
response to COVID. We have also seen a dramatic increase in mental health
presentations. I do not know whether that was expected, but I suspect that is
also a consequence of what has gone on around the world. As members know, those
increased mental health presentations are tying down our emergency departments.
We have a whole range of initiatives
to deal with this. Firstly, we have a huge expansion program in emergency
departments around the state. At Joondalup Health Campus, which is having the
most difficulties, this government is putting in place a $256 million upgrade,
in conjunction with the commonwealth. That is a major expansion to the ED, a behavioural
assessment unit to deal with drug and alcohol issues and the like, and a 30-bed
acute mental health unit. If the member goes to Peel Health Campus—I
was there on Sunday—he will see that there is a $10 million improvement
to the ED. It was all happening when we were there. We are also investing another
$152 million on a major upgrade to the hospital and ensuring it comes back into
public control. We are providing the opportunity for a private hospital to be
built at that site as well as part of our upgrades. Work is underway on a range of other hospitals, in particular Sir
Charles Gairdner, which is having $19 million spent on upgrading its ED.
It has been a difficult year. Obviously, our hospitals have also faced
difficulties because of the impacts of COVID, some of which were unexpected.
For a period, our hospitals were very quiet, but when they are very quiet, the backlog builds, and dealing with that has been the
difficulty that our hospitals are coping with. I would like to thank and
congratulate our health workforce for all their work during the course of this
year.