Spin doctors ‘examine’ health system funds

By Shaun Inguanzo
DEBATE over Dandenong Hospital’s elective surgery waiting lists has plummeted into a war of words between Liberal and Labor Party spin doctors.
Liberal spokesperson for health Helen Shardey on Monday issued a media release accusing the Bracks Government of failing to fix Victoria’s hospital system, as elective surgery waiting lists peak at 2875 people at Dandenong Hospital.
But the Dandenong Hospital operator and the Health Minister Bronwyn Pike’s office have raised their eyebrows over content in Ms Shardey’s media release, which contains an identical sentence and bears similar content to a statement released by Ms Shardey’s predecessor, David Davis, in November.
After reviewing Ms Shardey’s release, Southern Health, which runs Dandenong Hospital, told Star any response to the waiting list issue would be the same as it made to Mr Davis’ statement due to the releases’ similarities and same figures used in both from June 2005’s Your Hospitals report.
Ben Hart, a spokesperson for Health Minister Bronwyn Pike, said the similarities between the two Liberal press releases were evidence Ms Shardey lacked initiative to manage the health system by ‘plagiarising’ her colleague.
“It’s a bad sign that the new shadow health spokesperson is being even lazier than her predecessor in just spraying out generic press releases that rubbish our doctors and nurses,” Mr Hart said.
“Southern Health is doing a fantastic job in dealing with elective surgery.
“It has just won (the Government’s) inaugural Health Service of the Year (award).”
Ms Shardey defended the release and told Star it had appeared similar to Mr Davis’ because Acting Premier John Thwaites had also offered nothing new by re-announcing $30 million worth of funding to cull waiting lists, which was first announced by Health Minister Bronwyn Pike in July last year.
Mr Hart did not deny the money was already announced, but said this week’s State Government press release made no reference to any new funding announcements, and was rather a media event at St Vincent’s Hospital to follow up on the $30 million waiting list blitz.
“Clearly it wasn’t a re-announcement, it was the Acting Premier checking up on the progress of an initiative and our press release makes that abundantly clear,” he said.
“And certainly the Acting Premier didn’t pinch any quotes from previous press releases.”