Royal Hobart Hospital jobs being slashed

Reports RHH asked to shed 80 full time jobs
Nurses/doctors at risk of burn-out if vital support positions abolished
Cut fat in bureaucracy first
The Liberals understand that the Royal Hobart Hospital has been asked to shed 80 full-time equivalent jobs in non-clinical positions.

It is believed other staff at other hospitals are also in the firing line, even though these employees, such as ward clerks and orderlies, provide a vital support role to health professionals to assist with the patient’s hospitalisation.

In June the Health Minister said frontline jobs (doctors, nurses and allied health professionals) would be protected, but that the jobs of 185 non-service delivery positions in health would have to go.

It would be of serious concern if as many as 80 of these jobs were to be from the Royal Hobart Hospital, where chaos would rein if such a large number of staff were made redundant.

The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services told the Budget Estimates Committee earlier this year that he would be concerned if job reductions meant “we were dumping further work onto other people. That is not the way we need to approach this”.

Yet it appears that is exactly what this Government is doing.

Targeting positions such as ward clerks, customer service staff, orderlies and even switchboard staff means that somebody else has to take on the job of this person.

Dumping those duties onto nurses, doctors and other health professionals who remain in the hospital takes those health professionals away from patient care and can lead to burn-out and resignations.

Instead of targeting these workers, the Minister must look to cut the fat in her own bureaucracy.

I have yet to see solid evidence of where this Minister has reined in waste in the overall health bureaucracy.
Brett Whiteley MP Shadow Minister for Health and Human Services