Labor hasn’t cut me adrift: Hamilton-Smith
Veteran-turned-Minister for Veterans’ Affairs Martin Hamilton-Smith denies Labor has cut him adrift by proceeding with controversial plans to close down the Repatriation General Hospital.
The decision affects him on dual levels; it cuts across his portfolio, and the Repat is nestled on the boundary of his Waite electorate.
But the Liberal defector, who helped prop up Labor’s slender majority until it won Government outright at the Fisher by-election, says he’s been kept in the loop about the plan.
“One of the first things I asked when I joined cabinet was what was going on with health reform at the Repat,” he told InDaily.
“My issue is what’s best for veterans’ health and the health of the electorate.
“(Health Minister) Jack Snelling made a good case to me (that) the reforms he’s proposing are good for veterans’ heath and health for the aged … I’m confident they’ll all be better off through the health reform offering.”
Labor is forging ahead with the closure despite a nod to residents’ disquiet in its recent consultation, with a “community” Emergency Department to be retained at Noarlunga.
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Hamilton-Smith emphasised that Repat services are being relocated – “nothing’s closing” – with a new 55-bed rehabilitation centre and multi-storey carpark to be built at nearby Flinders Medical Centre.
Snelling was spruiking plans for the facility this morning, although he could not say when the blueprints were drawn up.
At $159 million, it will take the lion’s share of the $250 million of budget savings earmarked for Transforming Health.
Hamilton-Smith says he’s confident the “private health sector will ultimately move into the better of the facilities at the Repat” and “we’ll finish up with a health precinct there … along with retirement homes, with veterans having first right of refusal”.
He is still hopeful Ward 17, which counsels patients suffering post-traumatic stress disorder, and prosthetics services can remain on the Daw Park site, but those decisions remain under review.
Snelling said the reforms reflected changing demographics in the veteran community, and changing casework such as increasing instances of PTSD, with “people having to relive that nightmare in their civilian lives”.
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“Martin’s primary concern is the welfare of veterans and how we deliver the best possible services … and I think Martin agrees with me that putting veterans in facilities 100 years old is just not good enough,” he said.
However, Hamilton-Smith concedes there could be political implications for him.
“I can understand how people might play it that way, if the template you want to put over this is the local politics … but the fact is the Repat is oldest of all the hospitals we’re dealing with and the most in need of better facilities,” he said.
“I’m definitely standing (for re-election) … I’ll leave that to the people of the district to consider on the basis of what’s best for their health.”
The politically and emotionally-charged nature of the debate came to a head yesterday, amid a social media spat between Federal Liberal MP Jamie Briggs and Hamilton-Smith’s chief of staff (and former InDaily reporter) Kevin Naughton.
Briggs accused the minister of putting his own self-interest ahead of his constituents; Naughton countered that his boss “puts South Australians first – try it sometime”.
“I must have missed (his) election commitment to close the Repat to improve veterans (sic) health, but I guess he was a Lib then,” Briggs shot back.
“Duty first, not party politics,” Naughton tweeted back.
But party politics was on display today, with southern suburbs backbenchers (and trained nurses) Nat Cook and Annabel Digance flanking Snelling as he unveiled a promotional video depicting how the Transforming Health funds will be divvied up.
Cook revealed she spoke to her Fisher predecessor Bob Such’s widow Lyn frequently, but wouldn’t deign to try and talk her out of her implacable opposition to the closure of the Daw Park Hospice, where her husband spent his final days.
“I would never try and persuade her in any way at all,” she said.
“I’m just available as someone who’s lost someone too, and can provide a different perspective.”
She said there were safety issues with retaining Daw House for its present purpose, but maintained there is “no plan to sell off any real estate”.
“This is not a money-grubbing exercise,” she said.
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