MEDIA STATEMENT FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE,
THURSDAY, 22 DECEMBER 2011
“Grave concerns over privatisation threat to Christchurch public hospitals”

“There are grave concerns over the privatisation threat to Christchurch public hospitals,” said Mr Ian Powell, Executive Director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists, today. Mr Powell was responding to the announcement today by Health Minister Tony Ryall that the government would be looking at a public-private partnership in the design and management of buildings and support services in the rebuild of Canterbury DHB’s public hospitals in Christchurch.

“Under the guise of a ‘public-private partnership’ private companies would first be involved in the design of new buildings and then in the management of them and various support services. Their driver will be profits, pure and simple. There are big bucks to be made here. It would be like asking a panel beater to design a traffic intersection.”

“Public hospitals are highly integrated organisations designed to handle the most complex and urgent pressures in dealing with patient lives. Each part of the hospital depends on the other parts to succeed. The last thing they need is the introduction of fragmentation that this sort of privatisation would create.”

“This is code for partial or full privatisation. It is wrong to use the devastation of the Christchurch earthquakes to pursue a privatisation agenda and then to slip the announcement through on the eve of Christmas,” concluded Mr Powell.
Ian Powell

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