It is wrong for the Greens to say the Government has cut health over the past seven years when we have in fact increased spending, bed numbers and staff across the system.
The Tasmanian Liberal Government is prioritising health, with a record $10.7 billion investment over four years, and this year’s Budget includes $900 million more than last year’s.
We are recruiting up to 280 extra FTE health staff to support new and boosted health services across Tasmania, including the delivery of our elective surgery program.
Importantly, our recruitment efforts have already been very positive. Between July 1, 2020 and June 30, 2021, we saw an increase of 655 paid FTE across the health system.
Further, since the beginning of July this year, we have increased FTEs overall by 185, which includes nearly 60 FTE nurses, or 130 nurses across the board.
In stark contrast to Labor and the Greens who sacked a nurse a day for nine months, we have employed nearly two health staff a day for 15 months.
In the past five years, there has been an increase of approximately 800 FTE nursing staff, which is an increase of more than 15 per cent of the total nursing workforce.
We are taking a collaborative approach to healthcare and will continue to support our staff and patients to ensure we can deliver the right health care, in the right place, at the right time.