HOSPITALS — MATERNITY BYPASSES
663. Ms L. METTAM to the Minister for Health:
I
refer to the concerning revelations that there have been more than 60 maternity
bypasses recorded at Perth hospitals over three months amid an ongoing
chronic shortage of midwives.
(1) Why has the minister not prioritised the
recruitment of midwives and prevented the completely unacceptable level
of maternity bypasses?
(2) What urgent
measures are being implemented to address capacity issues amid the expected
baby boom over the next few months?
Mr R.H.
COOK replied:
(1)–(2) I
thank the member for the question. It is important for members to realise that
in the last 12 months of the Liberal–National
government's time in government, the number of midwives in Western Australia
in service decreased by 5.3 per cent. In the time that we have been in
government, we have increased the number of midwives by over 100. The member
pointed to the issue around bypasses and, yes, it is always preferable that someone who is delivering their
baby in the public system will be able to deliver that baby in the
hospital in which they choose and preferably with the midwife who has been
caring for them throughout their pregnancy, but it is not always the case. It
is not always possible, but it is preferable. We understand that.
I think it is important to understand
the context here. For instance, between June and August 2016, the number of bypasses under the Liberal–National
government was 38 in south metropolitan hospitals alone. This is coming from
the party that in government closed down Kaleeya maternity hospital and also
for a period threatened to shut the maternity services at Bentley Hospital,
notwithstanding the strong campaign put on by members of the community
and the Labor opposition at the time to stop that. We have seen a significant
increase in the number of people having their children delivered in the public system. There has been a 12.4 per cent increase
since 2015–16, so there has been a sharp increase in the number
of women seeking to deliver their babies in the public hospital system. That of
itself is a vote of confidence. We have also seen a significant drop in the
number of women accessing private health insurance
for the delivery of their babies, particularly during this COVID period. That,
of course, is another vote of confidence.
The way that we respond to these
sorts of demands for services is to increase supply, and we are doing that
through a significant recruitment campaign. As I said, 100 extra midwives have
been employed in our services since we came to government, with another 15
since January this year. What people would also
be looking for from a government is for it to make long-term plans to make sure
that we secure the quality and safety of maternity services in Western Australia
into the future. They would probably look to indicators such as $1.8 billion
for a new women's and newborns' hospital to be developed at the
Queen Elizabeth II Medical Centre campus.
I will be lectured to by a lot of
people, but preferably not the Australian Medical Association, which got its
line wrong this morning and, quite frankly, was just spreading mistruths, certainly
not the Liberal Party under which in its last 12 months in government we saw a reduction
in the number of midwives working in the hospital system, and certainly not
from those opposite who closed maternity services or sought to close maternity
services and under whose watch there was a much higher number of maternity
bypasses in south metropolitan hospitals.