IN THE ongoing political stoush over Redland Hospital, Capalaba MP Don Brown says staff numbers have increased by nearly 30 per cent.
Mr Brown said that he was releasing the information to end the debate between state government MPs and Bowman MP Andrew Laming over hospital funding.
However, Mr Laming has lashed back, saying payroll was just 61 per cent of hospital expenditure, and federal and state governments both contributed to payroll.
Mr Brown said the Labor government had delivered the staff increases and announced additional infrastructure, emergency and maternity ward expansions and funding for a business case to investigate a new car park.
“The good people of Redlands don’t want to see Mr Laming playing silly accounting games over funding, they just want to know the number of frontline staff at Redland Hospital,” Mr Brown said.
“Since taking office in February 2015, we have seen a dramatic increase of an extra 29 doctors or 20 per cent increase and a massive increase of 149 nurses or 41 per cent increase at the hospital.”
Mr Laming said that staffing was up but other investment had stalled.
“Employment numbers are up but services aren’t, as locals will attest,” he said.
In December, the politicians argued over $52 million, which Mr Brown said the federal government had ripped out of the Redland Hospital budget.
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Mr Laming argued that this amount was disputed due to the state government over-coding elements like constipation, as new coding options became available.
Mr Laming said that Mr Brown had claimed a $93 million increase in funding to the Metro South Health district which was a Commonwealth government contribution.
“From this, it can be inferred that state funding again won’t be increasing at all in 2018-19.
Mr Laming also questioned why the state government needed to study the parking crisis at Redland Hospital
“There is no reason to hold off the car park until an election year,” he said. “This year’s cuts would finance three multi-storey car parks.”
Mr Brown said that voters wanted to know how much of the $1.25 billion extra health funding announced by Prime Minister Scott Morrison last month would go to Redland Hospital.
“Can Mr Laming announce one piece of new infrastructure for Redland Hospital out of this new funding announcement by the PM?” Mr Brown said.
“I find it hypocritical of Mr Laming to complain about funding when he did not say a word when nurses were being sacked under the Newman Government nor when his state LNP colleagues … voted against our nurse to patient ratio legislation...”
