Shuffling around the same people is not the answer to Queensland’s woes, and Empress Palaszczuk needs new clothes, writes Kylie Lang.
Sky News host Liz Storer says Queensland’s cabinet shuffle is a “beleaguered” government’s method to “look like they are doing something when they are really doing nothing”.
Shunting Ms Fentiman into the worst job in state politics might provide the illusion of a government that cares deeply about the health system it has taken from bad to broken over the course of eight years.
However even a comparatively impressive performer like Ms Fentiman cannot be expected to clean up the mess left by her hapless predecessor Yvette D’Ath, and the bumbling Steven Miles before her.
Good on Ms Fentiman for calling for “transparent and efficient insight into the realities confronting our hardworking health workers” – after the reporting of hospital performance was obscured on Ms D’Ath’s watch – but seriously.
There is so much work to do to correct a flawed system, and no way the new Health Minister can deliver marked improvements before the October 2024 election when voters are poised to repay the government for its staggering incompetence.
It will take years to deliver the quality and consistency of services taxpayers deserve. Years to fix ambulance ramping, surgery wait times, hospital bed shortages, dire services in regional Queensland, bureaucratic bungling … and the rest.
When news broke of Ms Palaszczuk’s portfolio switcheroo this month I was on holidays on the Darling Downs. One local gent in his 80s nailed it when he said: “Different cabinet, same wardrobe.”
Newly sworn-in Health Minister Shannon Fentiman watches as Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk addresses a media conference.
Anyone who’s done a wardrobe clean-out knows how good it is to cull clothes that no longer work and make room for others that will.
A rule of thumb is if a garment has been idle for a year or more, then out it goes. This analogy is lost on Annastacia Palaszczuk.
If Ms Palaszczuk was truly committed to mending health, she’d never have appointed Yvette D’Ath in the first place.
And when it quickly became clear Ms D’Ath was out of her depth, she should have ousted her – not waited two and a half years as dismayed Queenslanders watched an endless stream of stuff-ups.
Here’s a recent snapshot:
May 2023: Australian Federal Police are brought in to help deal with a DNA testing backlog, six months after an inquiry revealed catastrophic failings in the state’s DNA testing program.
April 2023: Former patients expose shocking neglect and degradation in Princess Alexandra Hospital’s Spinal Injuries Unit.
March 2023: Revelations Queensland Health blew $18m for workers to stay on leave after refusing to be vaccinated.
January 2023: A “national disgrace” declared as a lack of maternity services at Gladstone Hospital forces mums-to-be to drive to Rockhampton.
December 2022: Ms D’Ath admits her department has “cultural issues” and Queensland Health staff are scared to speak up. The promise to build or upgrade ambulance stations is stymied by budget and timeline blowouts.
Governor Jeannette Young (front centre) with Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk (front left) and her reshuffled ministry
November 2022: The deaths of five babies are among 18 fatalities investigated at Caboolture Hospital.
October 2022: A toxic workplace and “systematic” failures at Mackay Base Hospital are blamed for botched surgeries and inadequate care that left three babies dead and dozens of women physically and mentally scarred. More than half of all critically ill Queenslanders trying to get into state hospitals are waiting too long in ambulances.
I could go on, but there’s no need.
The startling fact is that it took until this month for Ms Palaszczuk to take any sort of action.
At the very least, she should have banished Ms D’Ath to the backbench, not return her to positions in which she underperformed for three years – Attorney-General and Minister for Justice. Ms Palaszczuk also threw in the added responsibility of Minister for the Prevention of Domestic and Family Violence. Oh dear.
Meanwhile, Ms Fentiman – widely regarded as a premier in waiting – was handed a poisoned chalice.
There is much speculation about the appointment.
Some say it is a strategic play by Ms Palaszczuk to diminish the relative popularity of her prospective replacement ahead of October ’24.
Others say Ms Palaszczuk has finally tuned her typically tin ear into public fury and tasked her best person with turning around the shattered image of Queensland Health.
One thing is clear: shuffling around the same people is not the answer.
The Empress needs new clothes.
Kylie Lang is associate editor of The Courier-Mail
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