Ryall Tony: General Debate 
Ryall Tony: General Debate 
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Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) 
: 
 Would Lianne Dalziel please put a blanket over that member’s knees in case he catches a chill. That was the most pathetic little speech I have heard from the failed man who does not deserve to be in this House. 
Let us talk about credibility. Seven years ago that Government was told to start a national standardised reporting system for serious fatal errors in the New Zealand public health system. It did nothing. In the meantime people have died and services have not improved because this Government has done nothing. What has been released today goes to the heart of Helen Clark’s credibility. She is the Prime Minister who orchestrated the health system in our country today and it is the health system that is failing New Zealander after New Zealander. 
What a patronising pompous response that was today from the caretaker Minister of Health. Did members hear it? Let us just go through the nonsense that he said. First of all he said “We compare well internationally.” But his own officials told a press conference and a select committee today “You can’t compare the information.” Then he said “It’s only a few people per 10000.” But he did not know what his officials at the press conference said earlier today. Dr Mary Seddon said “Well actually we don’t count everything. We’re not telling you some of the sentinel events because they are confidential.” and “Our hospital cannot pull the information out of the system.” That is what she said. So the Government has tabled the information that it did not want to table. The only reason that information is being made available is that the Ombudsman has forced the Government to provide it. The Ombudsman has forced the Government to provide that information. 
And that information is shocking; that information is frightening. I think New Zealanders will be shocked when they see some of the mistakes that have happened: the patient whose skull was opened on the wrong side after the wrong patient’s CT scans were sent to the referring hospital; the brain tissue sample that went to the wrong laboratory department requiring the patient to undergo a second brain operation to get a sample; the kid who was administered the wrong drug and whose mother was ignored; or the rest home patient who developed a clot on the brain and died in her bed 3 hours later after neurological observations were ordered but not carried out. There is a litany of these stories. 
We should not blame and shame. That information should have been out much earlier on a consistent standardised reporting basis so the public could be assured the Government had done something. But instead we have only the tip of the iceberg. Even the Government’s closest advisers say that not everything has been reported. One of the advisers said that her hospital is not even able to get that information in order to be reported. That is how bad the health system has become. I agree with the  
Dominion Post  
headline “What is going on in our hospitals?”. What is going on in our public hospitals when over $5 billion a year extra has been put into the health system but Ron Paterson says that our hospitals are unacceptably unsafe? Is that what Helen Clark promised in 1999? Is that what Labour is about—that people who use public hospitals have to use them when they are unacceptably unsafe? Is that what Labour stands for? 
Hon Members 
: Yes. 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: Yes that is what Labour stands for. What would Michael Joseph Savage think? A public health service run under a Labour Government is described by a Labour-appointed Health and Disability Commissioner as being unacceptably unsafe. That is what is happening to our public hospitals. Seven years ago that failed Government opposite was told that if it brought in a national standardised reporting system it would save lives. That has happened in Australia and it has saved lives. But this Government just ignores it and it will carry the consequences in November. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Before I call the next member I ask the members on my right to please look at Speakers’ rulings 57/3 and 58/4.