Australian Federal Health Minister Tony Abbott today called for the establishment of independent boards to govern hospitals. The changes will be part of the next five-year Commonwealth-state health agreement Federal funding would be withdrawn from hospitals that did not agree to the boards.
Abbott says the purpose of the independent boards is to reduce bureaucracy and make public hospitals more efficient and responsive. "The board and [the] CEO will have control over budgets and make decisions about what happens in hospitals," he said.
Federal Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd said that the plan would create more, not less bureaucracy. "Not only are we going to have thousands of federal bureaucrats, thousands of state health bureaucrats, but now a new layer of bureaucracy as well," he said.
This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.
Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.
Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.
Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.
This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.
Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.
Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.
Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.