Twin attack most unhealthy

NARRE Warren North MP Luke Donnellan and Casey deputy mayor Kevin Bradford have made an extraordinary attack on the City of Casey’s overloaded maternal health care department.
Trouble started when Mr Donnellan accused the council of turning young mothers away from the service.
One of his electorate office staff members, Casey deputy mayor Kevin Bradford, also sent an email to Casey director of community services Jennie Lee with 10 questions about the service.
His questions were in response to a statement Ms Lee made to councillors that Mr Donnellan’s accusations were wrong.
Ms Lee told councillors that she had not been contacted by the member of parliament’s office for clarification of the issue and was confused as to why he was attacking such an important service.
Mr Donnellan’s press release seemed to hit the council like a bombshell because most councillors and staff have always been conscious of the need to foster community building and considerable effort has been made to keep this service up to speed.
The other side of the argument comes from Mr Donnellan, who has angrily hit out at the council officers saying they have not advised the councillors of the situation and that despite several meetings with the responsible government department have not fixed the problem.
He said Casey was the only council in Victoria not able to recruit nurses, claiming this was because of the way it treated its nurses.
Questioned on this point, he said it had to be assumed this was the reason behind Casey’s nurse shortage and inability to recruit.
He said this problem was unique to Casey and that his office was receiving a string of complaints about the service.
“I’m serious about this and I am trying to get something done,” he said.
Mr Donnellan said mothers were being asked to fill in questionnaires about their children’s progress and that this was shortchanging families.
The problem as I see it is that the council has clearly been struggling to find enough child health staff because of a national shortage of triple certificate nurses.
My view is that Cr Bradford’s questions to Ms Lee were bordering on insult.
He and his employer have been in a strong position to help the council through this crisis, but made their attack on the basis of complaints from two mothers, albeit they have reported many more complaints since Mr Donnellan’s statement.
The perplexing question is why take this confrontationist action?
Why not talk first?
Casey mayor Colin Butler told me that he was mystified by their action because the attack came after council officer talks with the Department of Human Services, and the engagement of new nurses.
“The crisis is really over,” he said.
Cr Bradford asked Ms Lee, among other things, how long had she known about the shortage of nurses and why wasn’t it brought to the council’s attention?
He also asked whether she had been aware of the two mothers who had been turned away from child health care centres, one because her child was over a year old.
He said the other was told the centre was too busy and that the child should be taken to a doctor.
My concern is why wouldn’t a member of parliament with concerns about a vital and sensitive service not approach councillors, one who works on his staff, and ask for an explanation before upsetting hard working staff?
Many of these services have been handed to local government over the years without adequate support from state and federal governments.
And Mr Donnellan’s action is certainly not supportive.
In the case of maternal child health care, it is not even clear which department in the three tiers of government is responsible for the service.
The staggering fact about this action is that councillors were aware of the ongoing struggle officers have had to provide the service going back to 2001.
The service was then in difficulty because births in Casey rose dramatically and councillors reacted by allocating money for a review of the situation.
Then a briefing paper in 2002 discussed the difficulty of attracting qualified staff.
One issue was that, added to the nationwide shortage of nurses, something well recognised, the nurses, unlike babies, were not moving to live in Casey.
They are initially charged with monitoring for early development factors the 4000 newborn babies who come along each year.
Medical issues are referred to a doctor.
This number will increase considerably.
So why would nurses travel across Melbourne to work in such a busy and growing service when jobs were available for the asking in more established municipalities where they lived?
Information on the service and the nurse shortage was provided at meetings on 19 April, 2005 and in camera on 19 July, 2005.
Despite these reports, Cr Bradford asks why were councillors not advised of the shortage.
The problem as I see it, is that no one was too fussed about the reports before the council, until a couple of mothers went to a politician.
We don’t know yet whether their complaints were justified.
Residents have the right to ask why didn’t Cr Bradford and Mr Donnellan seek more support from the State and Federal Governments in the form of bringing more nurses on line?
If we can’t get enough nurses now, what happens next year and the years after as Casey’s planned population grows and grows?
This is just another mess where we have three tiers of government involved in providing one service and where it is always the other person’s fault when something goes wrong.
This issue causes me some concern because it is difficult to get to the bottom of what really is going on.
Because of the serious differences of opinion on the matter between significant stakeholders I believe an independent investigation needs to be conducted to ensure that children are receiving adequate assessment, particularly during their first year.