McGinty's Obstetrics Mess Pt 2

The Court's Jester - now Health's Jester

The Desert Rat is aware that Jim McGinty was warned when he closed Woodside Maternity Hospital that the birth rate was increasing significantly. Woodside Hospital was the the public maternity hospital for women in the Fremantle and surrounding suburbs.

McGinty and Fong believed the figure given to them by their NSW consultants which have now been shown to grossly underestimate the increase in birth rate.

The West Australian recently reported McGinty conceding the birth rate had "unexpectedly " increased by 20%. The fool was warned, but was too arrogant to listen.

McGinty closed the 40 bed Woodside Maternity Hospital in East Fremantle (23 beds were funded) and tried to cram the women into a 10 bed ward at Kaleeya Hospital nearby. McGinty increased the beds to 13 after the stupidity was pointed out. Thirteen was chosen because that was the average number of beds needed, at the birth rate in 2005 at Woodside Hospital.

What the self-appointed Emperor of WA didn't understand is that maternity cases vary widely each day. Sometimes days only 4 or 5 beds were required at Woodside and two days later 24 beds can be required! It can be a feast or a famine.

What now happens at Kaleeya Hospital, and was predicted (and denied by McGinty) is that the women overflow in to surgical ward where all sorts of dangerous bugs exist. Some babies and mothers have contracted infections in the surgical ward, but this has been suppressed or hushed up - because it was predicted. Women get very upset being moved in and out of the surgical ward while the staff juggle beds.

The move to Kaleeya was to be for 5 years. The Kaleeya ward was converted to maternity for $2 million and savings were claimed. When asked in Parliament if he had factored in the cost of $800 000 to reconvert the birthing suite and other facilities back to a normal ward after 5 years, McGinty replied he had never heard such a stupid question. Really? If Kaleeya Hospital was run by Ramsey Health Care or any other private operator, they would have to do the calculation!

McGinty said the move to Kaleeya was temporary and the maternity ward would close in five years, moving to the the Obstetrics and Gynaecology facility planned to open as part of Stage 1 of Fiona Stanley Hospital in 2010. That facility was sneakily deferred to Stage 2 and the Fiona Stanley facility now won't open until 2018 at the earliest! Ten years late. A chronic shortage of beds and a broken commitment to the women of the southern suburbs.

The Reid Report rather stupidly recommended any maternity facility with less than 1000 births a years should close as they were too small!! Woodside had 850 births a year. Women like smaller facilities for childbirth. McGinty used that recommendation to close Woodside but moved them into a smaller facility! The move was designed to help fill the over-priced lemon that McGinty bought before the 2004 election on the pretext of getting rid of the elective surgery backlist. It was half empty and an embarrassment to McGinty, and so Woodside was sacrificed to conceal the failure of Kaleeya (with 5 operating theatres) to perform. McGinty closed the Woodside Hospital which could have been expanded to 40 beds and shoe-horned it into a smaller cramped facility, against the Reid recommendation - a 13 bed ward at Kaleeya.

Now McGinty has announced he will keep Osborne Park Hospital's maternity facility open - after announcing its closure. Has this clown lost the plans or does he make it up as he goes?

If you thought Jim Minister McGinty had much of an idea about how to run the health system, you should be seriously wondering by now. He has been able to look good because he has appropriated most of the State budget for his own ministries which have been awash with funds. This would normally be good but he has wasted probably half the health budget.

Fiona Stanley Hospital was to be built for $451 million in 2005, when announced by Jester McGinty. By late 2007 the cost was $1760 million - a 400% blowout in cost in three years, increasing by $2 million a day!

Not a shovel of dirt has been turned and Fiona Stanley Hospital was originally due to be opened in two years (2010). Worthy of a bit of doggerel the Desert Rat thinks!

Spreading the Wasting Infection

Architects and Consultants of the Utmost Fame
Were called to Fiona Stanley; but when they came
They genuflected to McGinty, as they took their Fees,
'There is no Cure for your Disease.'

Is it no wonder the Desert Rat now has little respect for this incompetent political despot.

McGinty: In total control of the ALP - and out of control?

Who will stand up and be counted?

The Desert Rat was surprised at the level of control that Jim McGinty and his Socialist Left faction now has over the Labor Party.

The control was reflected by the State Executive 126 to 23 vote for Reece Whitby, the landlord and property speculator who is being parachuted into the Labor Party and the seat of Mt Lawley by McGinty.

It is highly unlikely that Alan Carpenter made this choice or his "Poodle " Mark McGowan who tried to claim some credit, in one news story. This control of the numbers underlines McGinty's ultimate control of the Labor Caucus and the Labor Government and Western Australia.

The vanquished are the Centre and New Right factions who could only muster 23 votes. McGinty crushed and humiliated Ministers Michelle Roberts, John Kobelke and Margaret Quirk in the vote. That was the nett effect of these now stranded MP's who stupidly abandoned Brian Burke and have tried to politically cohabit with and outwit McGinty.

To make matters worse Jim McGinty got rid of Prisons and Correction from the Attorney General's Justice Ministry because he was getting too much bad publicity and had no ideas for reforming the corrections system.

He jettisoned these troublesome areas to Margaret Quirk and she has subsequently been starved of funds, making it doubly difficult for her to adequately fund the demands of dealing with the results of McGinty's chaotic court system.

Michelle Roberts has also been starved of funds by Carpenter and McGinty for her Aboriginal affairs portfolio. She will never look good trying to make ends meet while McGinty appropriate most of the funding for his own Ministeries.

The Desert Rat thinks that John Kobelke is a factional poodle and will never show any strength or independence and will try to join with whoever has numbers. Can he prove this assessment by the Desert Rat wrong?

These politicians have been unmercifully crushed and will see out their days with their tails between their legs - like camp dogs.

There is little prospect of these humiliated politicians publicly seeking help from Burke - at least not until he has seen off the attacks by McGinty's wretched Secret Police at the Corruption and Crime Commission.

McGinty Health Revolution

Spreading the Infection

After seven years, soaring rates of chlamydia, syphilis and gonorrhoea underline the disastrous failure of Jim McGinty's in the area of Aboriginal Health.

The Socialist Left ideology proselytised by Jim McGinty and fellow travellers has driven Aboriginal policy since the early 1970’s and many are now coming to realise that those well intentioned policies have been catastrophic for Aboriginal people.

Socialist Left Ministers have mostly controlled the social welfare ministries such as health, welfare and education in Labor Governments.

We have seen chronic failure but the political spin would suggest all is well.

In Jim McGinty's maiden speech to State Parliament on 31 May 1990 he declared:

"..... a number of groups ..... deserve the prime attention of this Parliament. I refer first to Aboriginals. .......

Numerous statistics exist and each of them indicates that this Government has not achieved in any sense equality for Aboriginal people. All the indicators point to an alienated, dispossessed and oppressed people. I will endeavour, in my term in this Parliament, to provide positive measures to support self determination by Aboriginal people, economic and social self reliance and generally to enhance the welfare of the Aboriginal people of this country."

Jim McGinty’s failure in Aboriginal affairs is reflected after seven years as the de facto head of the Labor Government in Western Australia and control of the health and justice system. The results have been declining health, increased incarceration, poor education standards among Aboriginal adults and an explosion in truancy by Aboriginal students.

It was not surprising to read Commonwealth disease surveillance figures that McGinty would never release in an understandable form. They show that in Western Australia there has been a massive 20% increase in chlamydia, and also soaring rates of syphilis and gonorrhoea. While the figure are design to confuse the notification rates by local government area show the problem has exploded in areas of high Aboriginal population.

Can we soon expect a “good news” media release from Health Minister Jim McGinty telling us how much progress is being made with the announcement of new initiatives – if the figures look like getting into to public area in an intelligible form!

Jim McGinty seems to thinks more new hospitals and more legislation in health and justice will fix the problem.

McGintiy's Ministerial Department and agencies are racked with an epidemic of fear and managerial incompetence. Will we soon have terminal ennui?

Part 2 The Media Release of 9 October and the Smith’s Beach Report.

CCC Spin exposes lack of integrity

The Desert Rat has always thought the media statement released by the Corrruption and Crime Commission (CCC) at the time of the tabling of the Smith’s Beach report on 9 November 2007 was defamatory of Burke and Grill.

Having read the CCC's Smith’s Beach Report and been unimpressed by the gloating, quoted comments in the media release by the CCC’s CEO Mike “Children Overboard” Silverstone, the Desert Rat mistakenly thought that there must have been another volume of the report.

The Smith's Beach Report and the press release do not properly relate to each other!

“What’s wrong with these CCC clowns?” the Desert Rat asked. Did the staff get their law degrees and other degrees from out of Weeties packets?

The media release was written with little reference to the report and was designed to inflict maximum damage to the reputations of Brian Burke and Julian Grill.

Take for instance the statement in the media release:

“Also, in the Commission’s view lobbyists (former Premier, Mr
Brian Burke and his partner, former Minister, Mr Julian Grill) acting as agents for Canal Rocks Pty Ltd and its representative, Mr David McKenzie, influenced or attempted to influence public officers to engage in misconduct.”

There is no such statement or finding in the Smith’s Beach Report! Additionally there is no evidence in the Smith’s Beach Report at all to support this assertion in respect of Julian Grill and Brian Burke.

This clumsy, false and defamatory comment in the media release is more about politics than Justice and reflects on the calibre of people employed at the CCC. The media release was a political attack on Burke and Grill and was designed to inflict as much damage as possible to their reputations.

If this is the standard of investigating and reporting that Jim McGinty tolerates in his government departments and agencies he cannot expect any respect as a Minister.

To compound the inadequacy he says the CCC is doing a wonderful job, despite the well documented litany of incompetence by the Corruption and Crime Commission.

Part 1. The Rewriting of Judge Hammond’s Report by the CCC Staff after Hammond resigned from the CCC

Playing Games at the CCC

Why Commissioner Judge Kevin Hammond left the Corruption and Crime Commission (CCC) was explored in an earlier post. The Desert Rat still thinks it was because of conflict between him and the CCC staff and the Desert Rat now develops that argument further.

Judge Hammond resigned from the CCC in March 2007 two years before his term expired and strangely after he had heard all the evidence into Smith’s Beach and the Grill Burke business dealings and had written the draft report on Smith’s Beach. The report was left to Neil McKerracher QC to complete.

The Desert Rat believes the conflict must have revolved around the Smith’s Beach Report. Internal people in the CCC wanted harder findings, that Commissioner Judge Kevin Hammond was not prepared to agree to.

Judge Hammond wrote his draft report thus satisfying his own view of what the finding should properly be and Neil McKerracher the Acting Commissioner was then to negotiate the final touches to accommodate any minor changes of emphasis with the CCC staff.

One month later, in April 2007, Acting Commissioner McKerracher advised Burke and Grill through their solicitors that there were no adverse findings or comment against them.

The final Smith’s Beach Report was released and tabled in Parliament in October 2007 – some six months later. Why such a long delay when the Report had been completed in April by Commissioner Judge Kevin Hammond and Acting Commissioner McKerracher?

What appears to have happened is that the staff at the CCC rewrote the Smith’s Beach Report in that intervening six months bringing in an adverse comment concerning Burke and Grill which were not in the Report done by Commissioner Hammond and Acting Commissioner McKerracher!

The Desert Rat should point out here that this is similar to the disclosed activities of re-writing Judge Hammond’s report by the CCC staff in the D’Orazio matter, which was very adversely criticised by Parliamentary Inspector Malcolm McCusker QC.

The staff of the CCC got their way on Smith’s Beach and thereby got the CCC themselves into deep and very hot water. This has been the source of the CCC troubles and, will be further developed in this series of articles.

In June, Len Roberts-Smith was appointed as Commissioner and must have become aware of or was involved in the rewriting of the Smith’s Beach Report. New Commissioner Roberts-Smith had not heard any of the evidence, had not seen the body language and intonation of the witnesses to make any judgment as to truthfulness.

Either Len Roberts-Smith was a willing participant in the rewrite of the Smith’s Beach Report or was not aware of the contents of the report written by Judge Hammond and completed by Acting Commissioner McKerrarcher. Either way he became embroiled in the problems created by the rewrite of the Smith’s Beach Report and its flawed, unsound and what now appear to be - indefensible findings.

The re-written Smith’s Beach Report with its broad new range of adverse findings, was tabled in Parliament on the 9 October 2007. The findings were without any basis and were findings that Commissioner Judge Kevin Hammond and Acting Commissioner McKerracher did not entertain!

Since then the credibility of the Smith’s Beach Report has unwound week after week. Only one small part of its finding is yet to be discredited and that is its findings against three Busselton Shire Councillors, which the Desert Rat will show are legally flawed.

Both Blind Freddy and the Desert Rat have now examined this finding and found it to be fatally flawed. It is unbelievable how incompetent the CCC have been on this issue as well. More will be revealed in the third post in this series.

CCC: Three examples of Gross Incompetence

Three articles revealing gross incompetence and intrigue within the CCC.

It is difficult for the Desert Rat to comprehend the sustained gross incompetence of the Corruption and Crime Commission (CCC) and why Attorney General Jim McGinty as the Minister responsible is paralysed when it comes to realising it - and fixing the problem.

In three following posts even the most hardened supporters of Jim McGinty will begin to realise how he has really “lost the plot” in his oversight of the CCC.

The first post will explore what happened to the Smith’s Beach Report after Commissioner Judge Kevin Hammond resigned as head of the Corruption and Crime Commission.

The second post will explore the media release on the Smith’s Beach Report and findings put out on 9 October 2007 by the CEO of the CCC, Mike “Children Overboard” Silverstone. The media release reveals the incompetence of the CCC in that it states findings that are not in the Smith’s Beach Report.

The third post will explore the CCC bizarre legally flawed findings against three Busselton Shire Councillors, which was until now, the only part of the CCC’s Smith’s Beach Report that has not been discredited.

Watch this space in the coming days for a few embarrrassing insights into the CCC.

Carpenter's Cant - Truth a Casuality in Spin

Carpenter's Cheap Shot at Grill & Burke

In his nonsensical comment about there being no urgency to reform contempt of parliament laws, Alan Carpenter made a glib and cheap comment that “Mr Burke and Mr Grill are authors of their own demise” (The West Australian 31 March 2008).

Some more perceptive observers may think it rather too early for Carpenter to gloat over Grill and Burke’s “demise”. The Smith’s Beach Report, redolent of something you would expect from the politbureau of an unaccountable regime, has completely unwound. More is to come in later blogs.

Two factors have contributed most to the current mess the Carpenter Government now faces with its Burke and Grill vendetta.

First was the inept anti-business Labor government was the catalyst for the explosion in demand for lobbyist after 2001 election.

Second is the incompetence of the Corruption and Crime Commission, which has little understanding of political process, who are the creators of the Government’s present problems.

Politicians are there to be lobbied by all and sundry – individuals, companies, industry and community groups - that is an important part of their job/role.

Politicians and public servants to a lesser extent are solely responsible for their decisions – not the lobbyists.

The only limitation on a lobbyist or anyone making a representation to government is that they must not bribe, threaten, force or coerce a minister, member of parliament or public servant.

A recent Tasmanian Supreme Court decision on a political lobbying case highlighted this fact.

The Desert Rat has issued a simple challenge to Jim McGinty that could abort the witch hunt - if no answers are forthcoming.

The three questions for Jim McGinty are:

1. What lobbying, in which Burke and Grill were involved, was against the public interest and why was it against the public interest?
2. What criminal or corrupt conduct were Burke and Grill involved in?
3. Is there any evidence or suggestion that Burke or Grill bribed, forced, intimidated or coerced anyone in their lobbying activities?

If McGinty or Carpenter could provide answers to these three questions, they could have saved the taxpayers the $90 million largely wasted by the Corruption and Crime Commission, most spent in pursuit of getting Burke and Grill “at any cost”.

One other certainty in this world other than death and taxes is that McGinty will never apologise for the behaviour of his beloved poodle the CCC.