Ambulance Service in crisis -- pleads for volunteers

As is so often the case with government "services", more funding simply leads to worse service -- with the extra money just going to an ever more obstructive bureaucracy. The Queensland Ambulance Service is a prime example -- perhaps even worse than Britain's "National Health". There was very little controversy about the ambulance service when it was funded by private subscription but since it was "socialized" a few years ago, the complaints have never stopped

The Queensland Ambulance Service desperately wants help. It is asking for volunteers to pull people out of car wrecks and drive them to hospital in an ambulance. The extraordinary plea came days after the State Government promised $50 million and 250 new paramedics for the trouble- plagued service. The ambulance volunteers also will be expected to do basic first aid. They will need no particular skills - but will receive training and uniforms.

Opposition Leader Jeff Seeney said the calls for emergency drivers made a mockery of Premier Peter Beattie's claim that the state had the world's best service. "It is clear the Premier's promise was as hollow as every other promise he's made on health, water, electricity and roads," he said.

Last month Sunday Mail reports revealed frontline anger at roster reform, excessive hours, lack of staff, vehicles and equipment, and lack of management support. As Emergency Services Minister Pat Purcell boasted of improved service, the officers in stations near Gladstone pleaded for help.

An advertisement in Wednesday's Calliope Shire newsletter read: "Wanted- Emergency Ambulance Drivers. The role includes emergency driving to hospital, extrication of patients from vehicles and residences..."

The above story by DARRELL GILES appeared in the Brisbane "Sunday Mail" on June 10, 2007





Foreign doctors to learn Australian

It is a tremendous indictment of Australian medical education that Australia does not train enough of its own doctors -- despite the fact that there is great competition from young Australians to get into medical schools

FOREIGN doctors are having speech lessons in a bid to improve communication with Australian patients and avoid medical mishaps. A pilot program is aiming to make doctors whose first language is not English easier to understand for the average Australian. The 10-week course tackles pronunciation, understanding of slang or colloquial "ocker" expressions, language attitudes and speech patterns.

A growing number of overseas-trained doctors are filling hospital and GP positions in Australia amid a national shortage of medical workers. Many take jobs in rural or remote areas, where they are more likely to struggle with cultural and language barriers.

Gai Rollings, director of speech pathology at Toowoomba Base Hospital, has started the program with doctors from Africa, India and South America. "I don't think they have trouble understanding our accent but they might have trouble understanding some of our expressions," she said. "We are looking at how they are actually pronouncing their sounds and how they put stress on words." She said the doctors' speech would be rated by members of the public before and after the course. "If (a doctor) asks a nurse to help putting this solution into an IVF, that could be a really risky situation if the nurse doesn't understand what he is asking," Ms Rollings said.

Andrew Schwartz, president of the Australian Doctors Trained Overseas Association, said the program was "a fine idea" but would not achieve much in practical terms. "We have got a drastic shortage of doctors so Australian people are going to have to accept they have got to listen and make sure they are getting their message through at the same time."

The above story by CLAIR WEAVER appeared in the Brisbane "Sunday Mail" on June 10, 2007






Global cooling?

Early snow in Southern Australia gets ski resorts off to good start. If melting snow and ice in some places proves global warming, surely extra heavy snowfalls in other places proves global cooling? Or am I missing something?



The timing could not have been better. As thousands of holidaymakers made their way yesterday to the NSW and Victorian ski fields for this weekend's opening of the season, that precious white stuff, which went missing for much of last winter, began to fall. With forecasters predicting a winter ofabove-average snowfall, it seems the disappointment of last season will quickly be forgotten.

The NSW town of Thredbo got off to a good start yesterday, with about 5cm of snow falling on the slopes. The resort will start operating lifts from this morning. Perisher Blue had two lifts running yesterday. In Victoria, Mount Hotham and Mount Buller had about 26cm of natural snow, with extra cover from snow-makers.....

Thredbo's businesses spent yesterday preparing for the arrival of the hordes of tourists who descend on the slopes for the opening weekend of the ski season. The town's population has already swelled with the arrival earlier this week of about 700 seasonal workers. Although the slopes open for skiers and snowboarders today, some took advantage of the empty slopes yesterday for more gentle activities. For the Fisher family, from Mackay in Queensland, the sight of snow was a novelty. At the urging of their four children, David and Julie Fisher made a special detour from their round-Australia trip for an afternoon of toboganning.

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The Keating recipe for Labor

Former Australian Labor Party Prime Minister and Treasurer Paul Keating has recently made swingeing criticisms of the present Labor Party leader. The irony is that Keating was a genuine and intelligent reformer who did much to make Australia more capitalist whereas the present leader offers no reforms other than to take Australia back to an era of all-powerful unions. So we have a pro-market reformer and a conservative reactionary from the same Leftist party at odds. Hard to get your head around. But the editorial from "The Australian" below tries to sort it out

THERE was something captivating yet preposterous in Paul Keating hectoring his party and the nation on ABC television's Lateline this week, wedding ring in view, carrying on like he had never made a mistake. In Keating's world, the pneumatic rams of reform introduced by the past two labor governments, his and Bob Hawke's, continued to massage the progress of an economic utopia for which he was responsible. Treasurer Peter Costello was merely the beneficiary of Hawke and Keating's brilliance and Labor, in a weak-kneed, bumbling fashion, was too scared, weak or stupid to embrace their heritage and claim the prize.

Beyond the extravagance of its delivery, there were some home truths for the Government and Labor in Mr Keating's spray, together with a few inaccuracies and glossed over disappointments. Contrary to those who characterise The Weekend Australian as a captive of conservative politics, we have long been making many of the points that Mr Keating has sought to highlight. Like Mr Keating, we have been a longstanding critic of the Howard Government's reform credentials. We believe the Howard Government has dropped the ball on micro-economic reform and its lack of vision has crimped the ability of the nation to capitalise fully on the boom fuelled by the rise of China.

The Weekend Australian has for many years lavished praise on the reform legacy of the Hawke and Keating years. The period from 1983 to 1996 transformed the way Australia does business. While not always responsible for devising the policy prescriptions, Hawke and Keating were brave enough to seize the reform initiatives identified but not implemented by their conservative predecessor. This included the floating of the Australian dollar and deregulating the banking sector. Keating can also claim credit for winding back import tariffs, opening the Australian economy to global competition, driving a wave of competition at a state level, introducing enterprise bargaining to boost productivity growth and introducing compulsory superannuation.

In Mr Keating's view, these reforms underpin Australia's contemporary prosperity and he can't understand why Labor does not want to claim the fruits as their own. We, too, have long believed that Labor has made a mistake in distancing itself from the Hawke and Keating reform legacy. While former Labor leader Mark Latham had promised to do so, he was persuaded against it. His error allowed Mr Howard to demolish Labor's chances with its interest-rate attack on Labor's economic credibility. The mistake has been compounded by the ALP's desire to embrace the ACTU's agenda to wind back industrial relations to the pre-reform days.

Labor in Opposition has handed the mantle of economic reform to Mr Howard, an oversight compounded by its decision to campaign against just about every economic change the Howard Government has implemented without putting forward any useful alternative plan. When it has put forward an alternative, Labor's plan has been to stake out the extreme position with Bob Brown's Greens or wind back the clock. On both IR and climate change, Labor has surrendered the centre ground to Mr Howard in favour of electoral risk.

In his Lateline appearance, Mr Keating was scathing of Labor's handling of its IR changes. He put forward a coherent alternative for the federal Government to use its newly acknowledged corporations powers to legislate a minimum wage and conditions against which all agreements, whether they be collective or individual, would be measured. Mr Keating said there should be neither positive nor negative discrimination for trade unions within the system. Unions, he said, were dying on the vine, lacked passion and were incompetent.

Keating's critique exaggerates the reality of the Howard Government's reforms against union membership but there is a lot of sense in what he says about Labor selling a simple message that includes a free market for wages with a safety net. But instead of the simplicity put forward by Mr Keating, deputy Labor leader Julia Gillard has allowed Labor to be dragged out on the fringe to support collective agreements and potentially pattern bargaining by the more militant unions. If Labor were to succeed in turning back the industrial clock, it would represent a break with Australia's post-war reform continuum. It would become the first government since World War II to wind back economic reform.

Through the accord and enterprise bargaining, the Hawke-Keating years delivered on workplace flexibility and, with Labor's links to the trade union movement, were able to encourage workers to sacrifice wages growth to compensate for the adjustment made necessary by the floating of the currency. While attempts to reform the waterfront were mostly unsuccessful, it was under the Hawke and Keating governments that iron ore producers started to tackle the inflexible work practices that restrained productivity. Labor delivered what The Weekend Australian's Paul Kelly has documented as the end of certainty.

While Mr Keating feels poorly done by in the recognition he has received from Labor, his foray into the campaign being mounted by Kevin Rudd is fraught with danger. Labor certainly has been poorly served by the small-target, defensive strategy adopted at the past three elections. But many of Mr Keating's criticisms are as personal as they are perceptive. It would be unwise to sheet Labor's failings entirely to Gary Gray or David Epstein.

Nonetheless, The Weekend Australian encourages Mr Rudd to take stock of Mr Keating's appeal to the brave. We had hoped at the beginning of this year that Mr Rudd would grab the reform nettle that Mr Howard and Mr Costello have been reluctant to embrace. This included a proper reform of federal and state relations in the areas of health and education. Labor's reform substance remains to be seen. It would indeed be unfortunate if Labor's election momentum were to be derailed by internal and petty squabbling. Or if the ALP's agenda again becomes inward-looking and driven by focus groups. In truth, while Mr Keating remains keen to take the credit, the reality is that the economy remains the Government's big story, an electoral appeal. For Labor, denial of this reality, or the historic role it has played, is no recipe for success.

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