PM Transcripts

STATEMENT FOR THE WERRIWA PRESS:
1 AUS RAIIA1
PRIME MINISTER
1974 BUDGET LIVERPOOL HOSPITAL
Campbelltown and Liverpool Hospitals should benefit
from the 1974 Budget allocation of $ 28 million for public
hospital facilities in the States.
The Prime Minister and Member for llerriwa,
Mr. Gough Whitlam said today that the Australian
Government had decided to go ahead with a five year program
of capital assistance for the provision, expansion and modernisation
of public hospital facilities.
" I anticipate that Campbelltown and Liverpool Hospitals
will be able to speed up their development programs throucgh
thleir share of the grant for 1974/ 75," he said.
Mr. Whitlam estimated that total fed. eral assistance
to public hospitals would exceed $ 650 million by 1978/ 79,
the end of the five year period.
The Budget allocation is a direct result of the
Australian Government's decision to implement the recommendations
of the Hospitals and Health Services Commission's " Report on
Hospitals in Australia". This was tabled in Parliament on
April 10 this year by the Minister for Health, Dr. Everingharn.
The Report made recommendations on the provision of
hospital facilities in Australia, and emphasised that health
services should be organised on a regional basis so that people
in each region would have access to comprehensive health care.
In the Report, hospital facilities were taken to incluide general
public hospitals, mental hospitals and other institutions
offering alternative accommodation for patients such as
nursing homes and hostels.
Mr. Whitlam said that the Hospitals and Health Services
Commission had as its objective " The provision of high-quality,
readily accessible, reasonably comprehensive co-ordinated and
efficient health and related welfare services at local, regional,
State and national levels." He said that it has been clear for
some years that not enough would be done to overcome deficiencies
in our health services until the national Government assumed
a greater responsibility for the provision of hospital and
medical services throughout the nation. / 2