Tuesday 16 June 2009
LABOR’S HEALTH BUDGET REVEALS TIME DELAYS AND BUDGET BLOWOUTS FOR RANDWICK PROJECTS
Today’s budget revealed the Sydney Children’s Hospital child and adolescent inpatient facility upgrade and the Edmund Blackett Building project will experience major time delays and cost blowouts due to the incompetent State Labor Government’s inability to deliver health infrastructure on time or on budget , Shadow Minister for Health Jillian Skinner said today.
The Sydney Children’s Hospital child and adolescent inpatient project which was originally scheduled for completion in 2009 at a total cost of $4.32 million, has now blown out by nearly $6 million to a total cost of $10.28 million and won’t be delivered until 2011.
The Edmund Blackett Building project at Prince of Wales Hospital was originally scheduled for completion this year at a total cost of $500,000, but has now blown out by $800,000 to a total cost of $1.3 million and won’t be delivered until 2010.
The delay in delivering the long-promised Prince of Wales Hospital Hyperbaric Chamber remains at 12 months.
“Today’s budget highlights the incompetent Rees Labor Government’s inability to deliver health infrastructure on budget or on time,” Mrs Skinner said.
“I’m particularly concerned about the $6 million budget blow out and 2 year delay for the Sydney Children’s Hospital child and adolescent inpatient facility project, which will leave young people in Eastern Sydney wanting,” she said.
“Labor’s failure to deliver these important projects on budget or on time is letting down the hard working hospital staff who are doing their best to deliver the high quality health services the community needs and expects.
“The real worry now is that these projects could experience further delays considering the $236 million cut to health infrastructure in this years budget.
“This massive cut in health infrastructure spending means communities will miss out and works in progress will be further delayed.
“Resident’s in suburbs like Randwick, Coogee, Kensington and Kingsford have once again been failed by the incompetent State Labor Government,” Mrs Skinner said.