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Budget savings needed
4 May 2008
The State Government must increase core health services and halt the rapid growth of its own central office staff in this week’s state budget, AMA Victoria said today.
“With hospital capacity straining to care for Victorians, the budget priorities must be better patient care,” said AMA Victoria President Dr Doug Travis.
“Savings can be made from decreasing the money we pour into recruiting more and more bureaucrats.
“What we really need from this budget is more beds, fewer bureaucrats and well targeted programs,” said Dr Travis.
The Department of Human Services had 9464 full time equivalent staff in June 2000 and 11,515 full time equivalent staff in June 2007.
This is an annualised increase well in excess of population growth. Dr Travis said the number of DHS staff should only increase in line with the growth in the Victorian population, with any additional resources put into direct patient care — more beds, more nurses and more doctors.
“We need to close desks and open beds,” said Dr Travis.
After eight years in Government, there is a need to examine DHS programs to ensure that ongoing programs are providing greater value than public hospital beds or proved preventative health measures. While there are several government programs that provide a public benefit, the urgency of the capacity crisis in public hospitals and the need for preventative health care means that resources must be directed to priority areas.
AMA Victoria is calling for an independent, rigorous review process. The target efficiency dividend from the review is set at one quarter of one per cent of DHS expenditure for each of four years.
“This just makes sense,” Dr Travis said. “A regular review is good practice, allowing for less effective programs to be terminated in favour of government priority areas, including more hospital beds and more effective preventative health care.
Combined, these two measures would result in savings of around $600 million over four years which could be reinvested in preventative health or direct patient care.
“The Victorian Government needs to determine what’s more important,” said Dr Travis. “Is it prevention, is it direct patient care, or it is extra staff in DHS?
“Hospitals are under pressure. A recent Ministerial Review told us that morale is low and doctors are withdrawing from the public sector because of poor conditions.
“We also need to look at long term preventative health measures. These are the priorities, not more desks.”
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