Children’s Teething Problems

The Auditor-General’s Report The New Royal Children’s Hospital a public private partnership highlights concerns in relation to a $35 million donation that was expected to come from the Royal Children’s Hospital Foundation and was underwritten by consortium partner Babcock and Brown International.

Shadow Minister for Health Helen Shardey said it had now emerged that due to the downturn in global financial markets there uncertainty about whether this $35 million would be available to the project.

The bottom line will be that unless this money is forthcoming either through the Royal Children’s Hospital or Babcock and Brown, taxpayers will have to meet the shortfall, Mrs Shardey said.

The A-G’s report also raises concerns about the failure of the Department of Human Services to develop a state-wide plan for the delivery of paediatric services despite a recommendation by the A-G on this matter going back to 2002.

A very complicated financial arrangement which involves the transfer of ownership of the Royal Children’s Hospital project to Babcock and Brown Partnerships, a subsidiary of original project sponsor Babcock and Brown International, is raised by the A-G as another concern. (p72)

According to the A-G this transfer took place in 2008 with the approval of the Minister for Health but apparently without his department providing him with documented legal advice.

The A-G raised some real concerns about the currency of the information put to the Minister which formed the basis of the department’s advice on this matter, Mrs Shardey said.

In the planning for the hospital the A-G noted that the Minister’s department was unable to demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of the development, operation and internal logic of its own forecasting model.

The A-G report noted that the Minister’s department also failed to provide evidence to show how advice from doctors and clinicians was taken into account when making adjustments to forecasts of increased demand at the hospital, Mrs Shardey said.

It is obvious that the Brumby Government based its projections for Victorian children’s healthcare needs on a declining birth rate forecast back in 2002, which everyone now knows was inaccurate and infact on the contrary, the birth rate in Victoria has actually grown substantially.

Here we have yet another A-G report demonstrating a failure by the Minister for Health to provide leadership or vision, or to plan appropriately for and adequate Victorian healthcare system, Mrs Shardey said.