The West Australian Government has been unable to say where hundreds of jobs will be lost from the state’s public hospitals.
The Government has declared the health system is overstaffed by “several hundred” employees, and said it needs to make cuts in positions and costs to get back on budget.
Premier Colin Barnett said the construction and staffing of three new hospitals, and the retention of staff at existing hospitals, had left the state’s health system running over budget.
The State Opposition attacked the looming cuts in Parliament, claiming it was an indication of Government mismanagement.
But Health Minister Kim Hames said with the health budget now running at more than $8 billion, or 30 per cent of government spending, it was important to contain rising costs.
He said the overstaffing problem was the result of some staff from Royal Perth and Fremantle hospitals declining to move to the Fiona Stanley Hospital (FSH).
In addition, he said extra staff had to be employed at FSH to deal with an initial surge in public presentations earlier this year.
Dr Hames said he could not specify where the jobs would be cut, saying that would be up to the Health Department.
“I’m not able to say where those staff are coming from, because each division has its own budget, and what we’ve done in these last few days is go to each division and say, ‘this is your budget, which is an increased budget on last year, that’s the budget you have to stick with’,” he said.
Dr Hames said the department had flexibility to decide how it would meet its budget, through either cutting costs or by reducing positions.
“If you can manage within that budget, you can keep exactly the number of employees you’ve got now, [but you must] reduce some overtime,” he said.
Speaking outside Parliament, Opposition health spokesman Roger Cook said the looming job losses were proof of mismanagement.
“It’s extraordinary that the Government should find themselves in such a bungled situation,” he said.
“The idea that patient care won’t be compromised as a result of hundreds of jobs being lost from our hospital system is laughable.”
Mr Cook said the job losses would place additional pressure on staff, who he said were already struggling to cope.
“We will see the staff that are left behind having to work harder and with less resources, and we will see patients have their health system and their health care compromised,” he said.