RHH backflip imminent

BRETT WHITELEY

Despite the heavy political investment the Premier and Deputy Premier have made in the waterfront site for the new hospital, Labor sources say that an announcement that it will not go ahead will be made next week – under the cover of the Federal Budget.

Brett Whiteley MP
Shadow Health and Human Services Minister
Thursday 7 May, 2009

RHH back flip imminent

· Premier and Deputy set for humiliation on waterfront hospital

· Labor to fall into line with the Liberals’ leadership and vision for a new hospital?

Premier David Bartlett, and Health Minister Lara Giddings are set for a humiliating defeat of their plans for a $1.2 billion waterfront hospital.

Despite the heavy political investment the Premier and Deputy Premier have made in the waterfront site for the new hospital, Labor sources say that an announcement that it will not go ahead will be made next week – under the cover of the Federal Budget.

Since becoming Premier, David Bartlett has been adamant that the waterfront is the right spot for the new hospital. (see Site of hospital what doctor ordered, The Mercury, May 9, 2008; Hospital site impasse: Bartlett refuses to consider new spot The Mercury, August 1, 2008 Premier stands form on port hospital site; ER needed on railyards hospital bid, The Mercury, August 2, 2008, all attached)

Even when a public consultation stage showed the waterfront was not supported as the site for a new hospital, the Premier and Deputy responded with a propaganda campaign, paid for by taxpayers, to try to convince the public that the government was right.

Well after the global financial crisis emerged, when the Premier was asked in Parliament on October 29 last year about the economics of proceeding with the new waterfront hospital plan he maintained: “…it will not put in jeopardy our strategy to provide a budget surplus and will not put in jeopardy our provision for the future, particularly in terms of major infrastructure projects such as the Royal Hobart Hospital.”

And even after a review of the working port showed that the proposed hospital compromised the minimum boundaries required for the port, the government still couldn’t bring itself to admit it was wrong.

It is understood the hospital will be canned on economic grounds, with the business case apparently amended since it was presented to the Government last December to justify this humiliating policy retreat.

It is believed the government will effectively adopt the Liberals’ vision for a new generation hospital in the current precinct.

The fact remains that the waterfront is a totally inappropriate site for a new Royal Hobart Hospital and it’s about time the Premier had the guts to admit it.

And it’s a travesty, for taxpayers’ sake, that there was no one in the Labor party with the vision and leadership to challenge the flawed waterfront hospital plans before now.

Millions of taxpayer dollars and years’ of wasted time have been spent on this folly, which was at the outset designed as a political distraction from the Bryan Green Tasmanian Compliance Corporation scandal. It had nothing to do with the long term interests of health care in this State.

The Tasmanian Liberals unveiled their plan for a New Generation Royal Hobart Hospital on the existing site for a fraction of the cost of Labor’s plan. It is sensible practical and affordable. It will enable greater investment in health infrastructure right around the State, and protect the working port and the Hobart CBD. It is an example of the vision and leadership for the future that a Hodgman Liberal Government will provide, in stark contrast to Labor.