Ryall Tony: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
Ryall Tony: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
[Volume:641;Page:11268] 
11.  
Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) 
 to the  
Minister of Health 
: Was a sculpture unveiled at North Shore Hospital recently; if so by whom? 
Hon PETE HODGSON (Minister of Health) 
: 
 Yes; the Prime Minister in her role as Minister for Arts Culture and Heritage unveiled the sculpture at North Shore Hospital on Friday 10 August. 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: Did the Prime Minister on that day visit the North Shore Hospital emergency department where patients are languishing on trolleys in corridors for up to 4 days and where ambulances are being parked up to provide more waiting areas for patients—or was the Prime Minister more interested in unveiling a sculpture that ironically represents “hope in places where it is needed most”? 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: I would have hoped the member would know the answer to his question. The Prime Minister did take a brief and unscheduled look through—[ 
Interruption 
] It was for about 15 minutes. She looked through the North Shore Hospital especially the emergency department. She then reported to me within 24 hours that she felt the emergency department was not up to scratch and that she felt it needed to be fixed. I agree with her. 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: Does the Minister think it is quality care for a North Shore woman with a shin infection to sit from 10 in the morning until just before midnight hooked up to a drip in a public waiting area of the emergency department waiting to get on to a hospital trolley where she waited another 18 hours before finally being admitted to hospital; is that the quality service that this Prime Minister has promised? 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: Struggling though I am to draw a link between fine art in the public health system and the member’s question my answer is that no I do not think it is acceptable. I do not think the Waitemata District Health Board emergency department is providing an adequate service; I do not think so. 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: Does the Minister agree with me that emergency departments are barometers of how well an entire hospital is doing and why is it that so many of the country’s emergency departments are gridlocked and unable to provide the timely care that their patients are seeking? 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: The health if you like of an emergency department is an important indicator of how the health system is going as a whole but it is by no means the full story. What happens in New Zealand every winter—and it is happening to an even greater extent in Australia now—is that the flu season which of course affects health professionals means that an increase in demand coupled with a reduction in supply comes to pass. In particular what happens is that wards get blocked because the hospitals are full then the flow ends up in the emergency department which is a really difficult position for health professionals and patients to find themselves in. In the case of the Waitemata board however the situation has been complicated by the fact that it is the fastest-growing district health board in the entire country. Over the past 5 years the population increase there has been greater than the entire population of Southland. 
Ann Hartley 
: Is the Minister satisfied with the situation in the emergency department? 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: No I am not and neither is the board satisfied. Neither of course are the staff satisfied and as we have learnt neither is the Prime Minister satisfied. In the House recently I said that the Waitemata board’s emergency department response times are the worst of all 21 district health boards. But let us also talk a little about solutions instead of just about problems. 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: You’ve no solutions! 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: The member does not want to know about solutions does he? [ 
Interruption 
] Does he want to know? 
Madam SPEAKER 
: We will have the answer in silence. 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: The solutions come in the form of first of all more money and the budget for the Waitemata board increased by 8 percent just last month; second they come in the form of more beds and 21 extra beds will be opening next month; third they come in the form of more staff which the board can now afford and it is actively hiring both doctors and nurses; and fourth they come in the form of changes to the way it manages patient flow. There is a particular issue about the design of the emergency department in that particular hospital. 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: Why after 8 years— 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: Eight long years! 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: —after 8 long years in Government and $5 billion extra a year is the Government only now admitting there are problems at North Shore Hospital after successive Ministers of Health in that failed Government opposite have justified the appalling performance that North Shore people have received in their emergency department? 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: The member carefully frames his question as though nothing happened in the first 6 or 7 years. Let me give him one statistic. [ 
Interruption 
] He does not want to hear the good news. Let me tell him that 6 years ago the number of doctors in Waitemata totalled 320 and right now the number of doctors in Waitemata totals not 320 but 570. If the member wants to do his sums he will find that is a 78 percent increase in the number of doctors in that one district health board. So let us not say that this is something that has occurred because nothing has happened; let us just say— 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: Why is it worse? 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: Oh the member does not want to know. If he does not want to know I do not mind. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: The member has an opportunity to ask supplementary questions. Disorder is being created by constant interruptions. 
Dr Jonathan Coleman 
: Does the Minister understand what an insult it is when the Prime Minister goes to North Shore Hospital to unveil a sculpture and in her speech she does not even mention the real issue of the failing accident and emergency department and does he not realise that the ideal spot for a sculpture representing “hope in places where it is needed most” is actually the Labour Party caucus room? 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: Once again the gentleman opposite takes the cigar for the smart alec comment. The truth of the matter is that the Prime Minister made an unscheduled visit to the emergency department immediately after she had unveiled the sculpture; she then got ahold of her health Minister and said she was not happy. There is a bunch of action around that and we are looking forward to some improvement which we can undertake because we are a party that does not get out of bed in the morning only to reduce the tax take. Our Government proudly invests more into our health system and we will see that investment come to fruition. 
Hon Harry Duynhoven 
: I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. In the supplementary answer before last you asked that the House hear the answer—after the Minister was interrupted several times—in silence. Immediately to your left members were severely barracking the Minister all the way through his answer. We then had another supplementary answer and precisely the same thing occurred except that the barracking was much more widespread. Even when you were quite stridently giving your request to the House just then for order a member on the National side of the House was interjecting on you. Please will you throw some of them out. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: The member’s substantive point is justified and I will ask members to bear that in mind. As you know I try to have a robust debate in this House but when there is a denial of the right of any member to be heard by means of orchestrated barracking then members will leave this House. 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: I seek leave to table an email of a report of a stunned onlooker at the Prime Minister’s visit to the emergency department who said she walked through very quickly making no eye contact with any of the people on the trolleys. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought. Is there any objection? There is objection.