The Federal Government's Mid-Year Economic Fiscal Outlook released this week estimates that Tasmania will receive more money in hospital activity funding than was estimated in this year's state budget.
This means we have the funding to deliver all of the health initiatives we promised, including an additional $76 million for elective surgery.
We have initiated a range of reforms in health including merging the three THOs into one Tasmanian health service, and releasing a Green Paper last week to invite a frank community discussion on how we can deliver access to better clinical services.
The $70 million budget blowout on the Royal Hobart Hospital had been incurred when we took government.
That's why we put work on hold and initiated the Rescue Taskforce, which has enabled us to save the redevelopment and add a critical helipad, a safe and workable decanting plan, a renewal of the hyperbaric chamber and an additional $2.4 million for Mental Health Services, at no additional cost to the budget blowout Labor had already racked up.
The $70 million we need to invest to cover for Labor's incompetence comes from the unallocated capital infrastructure funding in the budget. They should be thanking us for rescuing the project and keeping their RHH legacy at only the $70 million they'd already blown the budget by, plus the millions they wasted changing their mind on the redevelopment over 8 years.
It is breathtaking that Labor have the nerve to comment on health or the budget after the appalling mess they made of both. Labor and the Greens, with their renewed minority government aspirations, last week wanted us to spend $2.6 billion that they know the state cannot afford.
Hopefully when they sit down in late 2015 to work out what their policies and values are they might also discover some small level of understanding of how to read budget papers.
Hospital Activity Funding – State Budget estimates and MYEFO estimates
2014-15 | 2015-16 | 2016-17 | |
$m | $m | $m | |
2014-15 State Budget | 315.7 | 323.7 | 331.9 |
2014-15 Federal MYEFO | 320.0 | 336.0 | 350.0 |