Editorial: Cook’s $50 million hospital blitz is the right call that benefits all West Australians

There’s a reason that health has a reputation as the most difficult portfolio in any government. Rarely does the good stuff make the news. Instead, the focus tends to be on the bad stuff: the wait times, the failures, the misdiagnoses and stuff-ups. Maybe that’s a little unfair. Certainly, the Cook Government has felt so in the past fortnight. After all, there’s plenty of good stuff. Thousands of health professionals go to work in hospitals and clinics all over WA and perform life-saving and life-improving work every single day. But the reason the failures and the shortcomings get the attention is that the stakes couldn’t be higher. This is literally life and death stuff. And it affects the lives of every single West Australian. Every one of us will find ourselves in need at some point, and when we do we want to know that the hospitals and health services we turn to are functional and funded. There is nothing more important. The announcement by the Cook Government of an audit and a $50 million health infrastructure rescue package is a sign it understands that. They’ve taken the long way around — it took a week of reporting by The West Australian’s Charlton Hart and Jessica Page on significant failings within Perth’s Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital to get here — but what matters most is that they have. Whatever the route, West Australians will be better off for them having arrived here. The review into hospital maintenance, investigating just how things got so bad in the first place, will be headed by former under treasurer Michael Barnes and former Department of Health director general Neale Fong, both of whom should be able to be counted on to deliver frank and fearless advice for the benefit of our State. Responsibility for the $50m rescue blitz — which comes on top of the existing $271m a year hospital maintenance budget — will be taken by Health Infrastructure Minister John Carey’s Department of Housing and Works. On Monday, Mr Carey admitted that the $50m budget, which will be spent over two years at SCGH, Armadale and Royal Perth hospitals, may not be enough to fix the significant problems. “The review and audit will then inform future decisions, so it’s the start,” he said. “I haven’t shied away from the fact that, saying we have very old, ageing infrastructure, it is tough. But I acknowledge those concerns and we’re acting on it.” The fact is that no amount of money could ever truly be “enough” when it comes to health. There could always be extra beds, doctors and nurses could always be better paid and there’s always a newer or more advanced piece of equipment. Juggling those competing priorities is the health portfolio’s great challenge. In hospitals, they call that triage: addressing acute emergencies now while also taking action to stop the little problems becoming big disasters later. Responsibility for the editorial comment is taken by WAN Editor-in-Chief Christopher Dore.