Health Minister Shane Reti’s political drama
Friday, 2 August 2024
Te Whatu Ora Health New Zealand Board was sacked on Monday and replaced with a commissioner, Professor Lester Levy, who is tasked with finding $1.4 billion of savings.
Emergency departments are reporting long wait times and staff shortages, Dargaville Hospital has no overnight doctor.
Health New Zealand sent dozens of graduating nurses at Wintec, in Hamilton, offers of full-time employment in an email, before recalling the emails minutes later.
Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says he “is very aware“ long-standing short staffing issues across hospitals and in emergency departments could reduce public trust in the embattled health system.
“It something we're very aware of, and we want to make sure that people are assured that it is stable and that staff to know that they're valued,” he said.
It comes off the back of an unfolding political drama, after Reti on Monday sacked Te Whatu Ora Health New Zealand Board, replacing it with a commissioner, Professor Lester Levy, who is tasked with finding $1.4 billion of savings.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said the Board was “financially illiterate” while Finance Minister Nicola Willis said it “did not seem across” the details of its operating deficit.
However former board member, Dr Curtis Walker speaking to NZ Doctor, described the National-led government’s attacks on its financial and governance skills as “disinformation”. He said he disagrees entirely with Luxon’s description of the former board as financially illiterate.
Meanwhile, emergency departments continue to report long waits, and short staffing issues. At Dargaville Hospital there is no overnight doctor.
Nearby Bay of Islands Hospital is short 3.7 full time equivalent senior doctors - nearly a third of all its doctor roles. A source working in the health system told Stuff the 20-bed hospital was the next expected to struggle as a result of the shortfall.
Health New Zealand also sent dozens of graduating nurses at Wintec, in Hamilton, offers of full-time employment in an email, before recalling the emails minutes later, adding to a reeling of hopelessness for graduate nurses.
Student nurse Shannyn Bristowe, who is a representative for the New Zealand Nurses Organisation, said the botch-up shook people’s faith that they would find jobs in New Zealand, and many were looking to Australia.
“All we are left with is a huge student loan and no certainty of jobs,” she said.
Te Whatu Ora Health New Zealand has also dropped the equity tool, which treated a person’s ethnicity as one of five factors in non-urgent surgical waitlists, after a review found the benefits of the tool were inconclusive.
Reti said the agency would look at developing other tools that might help achieve what we wanted to achieve for equity. “They will progress further work on this,” he said.