VIEWS OF CORRESPONDENTS

Waihi Daily Telegraph, Volume XXXVII, Issue 9207, 9 April 1938, Page 3

VIEWS OF CORRESPONDENTS

fliP:"-.-!-** - !' ' HOSPITAL ADMINISTRATION sir,—Mr Parr’s bombardment of questions failed to draw Mr W. C. Kennedy on the major points of the hospital controversy, but we have Mr Kennedy’s pledge again that the Waihi hospital, so far as lays in his power, will be maintained at a standard necessary to meet the needs of the district—the needs to be judged by the Thames Hospital Board, of course, which will be right and proper so long as it is kept free of bias. Then Mr Kennedy proceeds to draw vegetables and eggs and bacon across the trail in lieu of the time-honoured “red herring.” However, he challenged me regarding my alleged “wild statements,” and while I regret the necessity I beg you to permit me to deal further with the position. Even though the position has materially changed since my last letter and there are, I understand, 30 patients at present in hospital, the fundamental question of the Thames board a attitude has not been at all clarified. Out of his experience in hospital affairs, Mr Kennedy must have known that the monthly income of the Waihi hospital is more than £2OO, and he admits the fact by saying that the figures he quoted “may not be quite correct.” He knows, and I think he knew, that they were totally incorrect, and he continues to lamentably “spill the beans” by stating that “in any case they are only used for the purpose of camouflaging the position.” What position, Mr Kennedy? And why the need for camouflage—for the term means “to hide”? Mr Kennedy’s statement at the board meeting he refers to—lsth February—was not an expression of determination that the status of the hospital would not be lowered, but this: “I hope there is no suggestion of the lowering of the status of Waihi and Coromandel hospitals.” Mr Madgwick’s retort was not reassuring nor did it show a proper understanding of the circumstances, and the chairman’s reported remarks obviously fenced with the position. Mr Kennedy agrees that public men should be careful what they say, but there are times when public men should come forward with explanations of their stewardship, and the people of Waihi are most anxious to know wliat is to be the fate of their institution. Specious one man promises do not go far in a matter of this gravity. Mr Kennedy is, lam sure, sincere in his statement that he will work for the maintenance of the present status of the hospital, and that the institution will never be closed while the people of the surrounding district require it; but how does he propose his board will “camouflage” the following points and explain to the 6100 people living on the Waihi 'Plateau just how these points are designed to improve rather than reduce the status of the institution, and reassure the people:

1. When the secretary (Mr Tonge) came to Waihi with Mr Gunn, the department’s inspecting accountant, and during a discussion on certain aspects of finance, Mr Tonge said: “Oh well! That won’t matter, you’ll be only a cottage hospital in a few weeks.” That could not have been his own opinion, but rather what he would have gathered from the deliberations and discussions of his board! 2. Mr Brenan, chairman of the board, outside my office a few days later, strongly advised the office assistant to accept a position she had been offered “because the only thing I can see for this (Waihi) hospital is to close it down.”

3. During the board’s visit of inspection on Bth February both the chairman and the secretary stated that the hospital would require more than £IOOO to put it into anything like condition. This was published, but subsequently the figure was modestly amended to about £SOO. Now the architect is on the job, and we are anxious to know what his estimate of the cost will be over £250.

4. A few days later the chairman instructed the matron to arrange for reductions in staff to provide for no more than 15 beds —a cottage hospital — a nd the staff has been reduced from 21 to 15.

5. Mr Kennedy and other members of the board were made to believe, and to publish, that the revenue of the hospital was but £2OO per month and the expenditure £6OO. Why? except to create a wrong impression among the people.

6. The Minister of Health and de partmental officers previous to am algamation stated that there would certainly not be any reduction in status but rather an increase, but subsequently the Hon. Minister amended his attitude very materially by advising on 12th December, after amalgamation had been consummated, “That the Government’s intention is that there shall be no curtailment of hospital board services as the result of amalgamation.” A statement such as that might mean anything, even to increasing Thames accommodation to meet the closing down of Waihi and Coromandel, and it seems to dovetail into the written evidence submitted by the Mayor of Paeroa. Mr W. Marshall, at the time of the Commission. 7. The board asked the Minister to come up and inspect the legacy of ghastly wrecks of institutions the upkeep of which has been thrust upon the other contributory authorities by amalgamation; but the Minister could not come up so a deputation repaired to-Wellington to seek “Jinancial assistance towards the great amount of maintenance required to the Waihi and Coromandel hospitals.”

These are plain facts, not “wild statements” as my friend Mr Kennedy suggests, and there can be no doubt that they have been designed to show to the other contributory bodies what an intolerable burden Waihi and Coromandel are proving to the Thames board and calculated to prepare the people for the drastic re-

Auction of the Waihi hospital services, which would dovetail again in Mr Marshall’s commission evidence.

These points must fail in their first intention because from Ist December to 31st March Waihi levy and subsidy will amount to £IGGO, and miscellaneous revenue to another £4OO (if it is chased up)—over £2000; and ordinary expenditure less than £450 per month or £IBOO for the same period. This shows a surplus for the repairs necessary. They must also fail in their second intention because there is no good and sufficient reason for considering the reduction or closing down of Waihi hospital until the effect or amalgamation is fully tested. Since the upheaval of 1935 (which need not have ocurred at all) the institution has certainly suffered in the numbers of patients treated, but now that the boundary barriers are down and the hospital is available to all the people resident in Waihi, on the Plains, Waikino, Waitawheta, Waitekauri, Karangahake and as far as Whangmata, there is no reason at all why the average occupied beds should not reach the thirties as before —and as a matter of fact they have. People have the right to enter the hospital of nearest succour wherever they rates might be paid, and the old restrictions and financial impositions have been argued and maintained for far too long. The people should not be made to suffer any further just because two boards happen to be at loggerheads over a most unfair section of the Hospitals Act. As I see it, the Thames Hospital Board is 100 per cent, in favour of the proposals outlined by Mr Marshall in his evidence before the Commission—that is, seeing amalgamation has been forced upon them whether they liked it or not, to proceed at once with the provision of a base hospital at Paeroa (which would be grand for Paeroa) and reduce the establishments at Waihi and Coromandel. We people up on the Plains need not kick at that proposal so long as there are good roads and sufficient ambulances to deal with the transport of the sick; but we must object, and object effectively, if the Thames board, in following that policy, attempts to lower the status of our hospital while the base hospital is still a myth and the roads remain in their present state. And they must not be allowed to reduce our hospital so that they can say to the Government: “See, it is no use retaining this institution which at best has become merely a clearing station while the Thames hospital is. hopelessly overcrowded.” That is probably what they want to be able to say, but while we have nearly 500 men engaged in hazardous occupations and 6100 people up here to cater for (one-third of the total population of the whole of the board’s area) \*e must not allow them to have the opportunity of saying it, much less of getting away with it. — I am, etc., W. C. COLLIER.