Government to replace Health NZ board with commissioner
The government is installing Health NZ Te Whatu Ora’s board chair Lester Levy as a commissioner, replacing the organisation’s board.
The organisation will also be split into four regions, with a deputy chief executive brought in for each region.
The board normally has seven members but this is down to two, after three members opted not to serve another term and two others resigned with more than a year remaining.
Levy was recently appointed chair of the organisation, and will take over as Commissioner for 12 months.
Health Minister Shane Reti announced the move alongside Prime Minister Christopher Luxon at the weekly post-Cabinet media briefing on Monday, saying it was a response to “serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook”.
Dr Reti said Health NZ was heading towards a $1.4 billion deficit by the end of the financial year, initially reported to him in March.
“In the months since, the situation has worsened. Health NZ is currently overspending at the rate of approximately $130 million a month,” he said.
Jesus wept, the speed of the Right Wing Blitzkrieg continues at pace.
Manufacturing crisis in public services is the political project of the Right.
Using Commissioners to take over the entire public Health system is an unbelievable act by this Government that is serious and demanding scrutiny because the Government have just taken over all public health and are now directing them to sack 3000 people!
This isn’t social policy, it’s a bloody amputation!
In the Budget, National allocated just 2.9% increase to health services but inflation was 3.3% and population growth 2.6% while an ageing population adds more to costs.
National gave 2.9% for health but we needed 8% to stand still, is the electorate dumb enough to fall for National’s latest manufactured public service crisis to introduce more failed free market reforms?
The Minister says we can’t afford $1.4billion for health but we could borrow $14billion for tax cuts, again is the electorate dumb enough to believe this?
This is really serious and the speed with which it has been forced by a Government hell bent on borrowing for tax cuts but not for public services!
We wouldn’t be needing to find an extra billion if we weren’t borrowing $14 billion for tax cuts!!!!!!
This is occurring as Newshub is dead and the level of fourth estate journalism blunted.
The guard dogs of democracy have been anesthetized and replaced with Social Media hate algorithms.
We are in a lot of trouble.
If Health NZ were the Tobacco Industry, would this Government be sacking staff?
Retti was on the board of whangarei hospital while sewage was running down the walls .Levy was in cgarege at Middlemore when it too had sewage running down the walls .However Levy is a good people manger but how he will justify sacking up to 3000 people this year is to be watched with interest .A brand new hospital on the north shore has opened a ward by closing 2 at the other hospital to staff it .How is Levy going to sack 3000 yet find staff for 5 wards at north shore .
Retti stopped a new build at Whangarei on election night which would have given Northland cancer care locally instead of having to travel from Kaitia to Auckland for treatment .
I recently had the need for a CT scan at Waikato hospital .My GP said she doubted it would happen any time soon .However the back office swung into operation and I was scanned with in the month .The same applied to a persistant eye issue .My previous GP would not refer me for assesment .Her replacement refered me at first time of asking .Once again the back office swung into acction and an appointment was acctioned to see a consultant at the eye clinic .An operation was diagnosed and once again the back office swung into action and I had surgery 1 month later .
The beleif that we dont need back office people is bull shit .I would doubt I would have had either procceedure without the back office if the front facing consultant had to make all the arrangement .
During my 5 visits for these proceedures and follow up I did not see one person sitting around doing nothing .
You forgot to mention staff walking around Middlemore with pet flea collars around their ankles when Levy was in charge.
Luxon was an embarrassment on RNZ yesterday morning. He couldn’t answer rather basic questions when pushed, and did his usual truth twisting routine.
A thousand paper shufflers sacked in Wellington sounds like a great start to me!
Who will pay the staff,who will organise the waiting lists,who will compose the letters to GP’s who will compile the operating lists,who will organize the outpatients lists, etc.etc.etc.etc.etc. All hospital employees are front line staff
yep fucken great .Now we have to pay redundancy and the dole plus other benefits while they sit at home doing nothing .Then there is the sale of their home because they cant pay the mortgage or rent .Then there will be another 5000 kids in poverty .
Next week you will be calling them lazy cunts because they dont have a job and as you well know there arr less jobs every day
Whilst in the media Reti has stated that there is no cuts to front line staff, whilst true they have frozen any recruitment and will not replace anyone leaving. That in effect is a cut to front line staff.
As others have indicated the $130 million a month overspend is not an overspend it is money required to keep health NZ running. Cut that funding and there will be dire consequences.
Health NZ have been quick to criticize the Government and it’s spin of back office bureaucracy as the cause for the overspend when they revealed it was pay equity and an increased number of nurses as the cause.
Very interesting that the government want NZ Health to account for every dollar spent on them yet David Seymour does not want the same accountability for funds provided to Charter schools, saying it will inhibit Charters schools ability to achieve academic results.
Now I’m no rocket scientist but you certainly don’t need to be one to see the atrocious hypocrisy in this government.
Failed Charters schools, as history has shown, is placed at a higher level above every kiwi requiring health care.
Social media algorithms wouldn’t exist if the so-called guard dogs of democracy actually guarded democracy, but no, they simply amplify the undemocratic measures that government of all persuasions champion. Meanwhile, the other guard dog, the opposition, is doing what…..
This is all so familiar to anyone who follows UK politics. Electorally you can get a way with running down public health service because it is only ever a minority that depends on it a given point in time. Those not immediately dependent on public health services can be persuaded to look at them as just another ‘burden on tax payers’.
Playing everything the public service does as ‘costing too much’ or ‘running a deficit” is a simple and very effective political strategy. The NZ media laps it up and amplifies the catastrophizing with phrases like ‘financial disaster’, ‘1.4 Billion dollar budget blowout’ – as though scripted by Nicola Willis herself.
The government knows what it’s doing because it is following a play book that worked successfully for the Tories in the UK – who remained in power for 14 years despite starving the public sector of funds and driving the economy into ditch.
There are a lot of voters who take the public sector for granted and don’t consider it as adding anything of value to their lives or the lives of future generations – who are the people who really benefit from high levels of investment and funding in public services.
This is democracy and we all have to accept and live with the consequences of what the current government are doing. And – at the same time – try not to feel an overpowering sense of rage at the stupidity and shortsightedness of NZ’s citizenry.
If you follow UK politics I dare say you watched Boris on Monday. The comment was made he wasted a singular opportunity of a large majority to prove he could rule .In the history of NZ the same will be said about Jacinda’s government .Nothing big achieved in 3 years so whatever National do it will improve on what Labour did.
I am amazed that National have spent months undoing lots of nothing. How is that possible?
This iteration of National will be remembered as f’ing disaster at this rate.
Again you are wrong, National are already taking us backwards.
…”public health service because it is only ever a minority that depends on it a given point in time.” Really! So what happened in the UK when Covid hit and the NHS was being run into the ground by the Tories?
Spot on. This needs to be shared far and wide. Thank you Martyn.
Our local MP had this comment in an unsolicited letter that arrived this week “When we took office, we were shocked to learn that the previous government had not sustainably allocated funds to Pharmac, leaving us with a fiscal cliff to fix and people without essential medicines.”
While the obvious explanation is that they are too stupid or lazy to read the publicly available information that explains government spending it seems that blaming the previous government is easier.
If they last 3 years I expect things to be substantially worse for most of the population although the inevitable economic crash might arrive while they are still in charge which will be an interesting experience.
That crash will be here any day now .Looking in the main street where I live its well on the way.The street is usually full from 10am to 2pm with no where to park .Now I can go down any time and get a park .Also the number of heavy trucks passing through has reduced remarkably .These are signs of a collapsing economy .National talked the economy down for the last two years they were in opposition and are now reaping what they sowed.
This is a one term government or we are doomed to the world scrap heap .Exports and imports are both falling which is a sure sign we are in the shit.
clearly your MP is a mindless fuck
” Innovation ” cited Luxon will fix the health system. Try 29 hours at A and E, dreadfully sick waiting for a ward bed, where the new technology solutions of a ‘ voice recognition ‘ device won’t let nurses and doctors in on the patient data system.
It recognised clipped robotic American voices ahahahaha.
Then try a year waiting for the report to hit your GPs office.
Then try a ward where every single, kiwi trained nurse left this year alone to go overseas !
Then throw in the IT outage where ambulances couldn’t be dispatched. And 1 hour later arriving at Waikato hospital, a cardiac patient is rushed off to xray , dies in the corridor on the way while his poor wife is still sitting in the cubicle unaware her beloved was the reason for the code red bells and rush of staff abandoning the A & E department !
Yet $ 1.4 BILLION still to be cut.
I hope like hell the current NATZIs don’t ever experience the real tradegy the loss of this man is because of their ” targetted repriorisation “.
Maybe Luxon will do a national public speech for the loss of this great man like he did for his rich mate’s wife.
” Innovation ” cited Luxon will fix the health system. …….Thats another lie from Luxon as Reti has just announced they will stopping the IT systems work to connect the country’s health system to one database and system, where currently if you get injured (or whatever) in another region, you have to request relevant info/notes by phone/ fax /scan to email from your home DHB – backward. Work has already been done and stopping it will be a massive waste of taxpayer money just like stopping the order for new Cook Strait ferries which will cost hundreds of millions for nothing in return. That is what I call waste and dumb. Seems to be a theme of this coalition of morons.
Many on here obviously know nothing of the NZ Health system judging by their uneducated biased right wing comments. A true reflection of our health system can be read in the transcript below…
Further huge health cuts unveiled by the Government will only harm the services New Zealanders depend on.
“The Government is being irresponsible in ordering further deep cuts at a time it should be investing more in the health service,” said Public Service Association Te Pūkenga Here Tikanga Mahi Assistant Secretary Warwick Jones.
“The Government chose to give $14 billion in tax cuts to landlords and middle-income earners and ignore the clear need for significant additional investment in health to meet the needs of a growing and ageing population, and the increasing cost of medical technology.
“We are not talking about the budget for a household or a business. Budgeting in health has for a long time been about population growth requiring increased investment to just maintain current levels of service provision, let alone fix well-documented major workforce issues.
“After so much restructuring in health in recent years, proposing even more smacks of a secret agenda.
“First it was Kāinga Ora, and now it’s Te Whatu Ora. We are deeply concerned the Government is setting the stage for increasing privatisation of health services,” says Jones.
Minister Reti referred to growth of administrative and management roles as a reason for drastic action.
“Our experience is the system has been losing people, not adding to the workforce. This is another major health decision that seems to be taking place in a totally different reality to the one health workers are living in.
“There have been 18 change processes for health workers in the last two years alone. The whole point of them was to ‘simplify to unify,’ including reducing duplication of roles as 29 DHBs and entities became one. It is extremely unclear who the Minister is talking about.”
Workforce data held by the PSA indicates administrative workforce levels have not changed significantly since the (the DHB) Administration and Clerical pay equity claim – a process that went from 2018 to 2022.
“Is the Minister referring to people who moved to Te Whatu Ora from the Ministry of Health, the Health Promotion Agency, or other entities as new roles? Management positions have been created but they replace roles of local managers at DHBs, not generating a raft of new ones.”
“Endless change does not lead to a strong and effective health system; it leads to chaos and brings a great emotional toll.”
“It is unfathomable to think a health system already under significant strain could restrict $1.4 billion further without impacting how people receive health services,” Jones says.
Levy needs to remember health still owes millions in unpaid holiday pay to current and former staff .Levy is a capable person but I feel he is being set up as the fall guy for ciggaretti .When he wakes up and sees why most of the board Quit and no one else wanted the job he will realise he is in deep shit .Already it has been explained to him that the increase in expenses was for the extra that had recently been recruited .Add to that the 20% increase in population that national pleaded for when in opposition and of cause it will cost 20% more .
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