Queensland Health should own and run the car parks at the state's hospitals to give it the opportunity to generate millions of extra dollars for hospitals, an Auditor General's report points out.
Auditor General Andrew Greaves on Tuesday morning tabled a report investigating the viability of decisions to build Queensland's last three public hospitals at the Sunshine Coast, the Gold Coast and the Lady Cilento Children's Hospital at South Brisbane.
Overall the Auditor General's report found that the final cost of Queensland last three public hospitals is $5.08 billion, more than $2.2 billion over Queensland Health's original cost estimates.
Opposition health spokesperson Jo-Ann Miller said Labor updated these estimates as the final business cases for each hospital were approved.
"As the Auditor General clearly states on page three, the cost difference between the final business case and current budget for three major hospitals over eight years is 3 per cent," Ms Miller said.
"This represents a difference of $152 million with the Sunshine Coast University Hospital actually now $101 million under budget."
However the report shows the report shows more than $170 million was wasted by bad planning by successive state governments while those last three hospitals were built.
In addition, the report also highlights that an additional $190 million in financial benefits went to "third- party" companies and operators instead of being better used by Queensland Health.
The report points out that 64 per cent of this lost revenue is from revenue at the private car parks at the three hospitals.
Mr Greaves questions these short-term losses in revenue and recommends Queensland Health build and run car parks to generate hospital money.
"Queensland Health has a policy of not facilitating the provision of car parks at its facilities because it is not its core activity," the Auditor General's report says.
"While this approach avoids upfront capital outlays and removes the risk of ownership, it also deprives Queensland Health of the opportunity to use car park revenue to contribute to the operating cost of the hospitals."
One of the five main recommendations of the Auditor General's report is that Queensland Health reviews its policy on running its own hospital car parks and using the revenue itself.
At the new Sunshine Coast University hospital, built under a public private partnership, taxpayers did not pay for the two car parks, which provide an economic "value" of $54 million, according to the Auditor General.
However Queensland receives no further revenue from the car park, run by Exemplar Health, until it returns to state ownership until 2041.
The Gold Coast University hospital's car park was also built under a public private partnership and taxpayers also did not pay for the car park.
However no revenue will be received for 31 years, despite the car park being valued at $91.9 million by the Auditor General.
Car parks at five Queensland's hospitals are run by Metro Parking, which operates 5600 car parks at the Royal Brisbane and Womens', the Prince Charles, the Royal Childrens', Princess Alexandra and Toowoomba hospitals.
Queensland Health last reviewed the possibility of running car parking themselves at Queensland Hospitals in March 2013.
That 2013 review said any decision would have to be made by the state's 16 individual hospital and health boards.
"While the outcomes of the report provided some key focus areas regarding hospital car parking issues across the state, the transfer of the ownership of land and building assets to Hospital and Health Services will see the local development of the most appropriate solutions to the various hospital car parking needs for Queenslanders," a Queensland Health statement said.
The Queensland Opposition said a decision by a future Labor state government to run car parks at Queensland hospitals would need to be assessed by the independent Building Queensland authority.
Labor's policy asks for business cases to be prepared for any government infrastructure project valued over $50 million and for the public release of a cost-benefit analysis and the business case for projects valued at $100 million or more.
