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Speaker 1: My name is Hedley Thomas.

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Speaker 2: Sick to Death is based on my book of the

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Speaker 2: same name, and it's the true story of doctor Jan

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Speaker 2: Patel's lies and manipulation and the herculean.

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Speaker 1: Effort it took to finally stop him.

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Speaker 2: We've used voice actors throughout this series, and on occasion

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Speaker 2: the real people from the story have read their words

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Speaker 2: for us.

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Speaker 1: It is brought to you by me and the Australian.

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Speaker 2: Chapter sixty four Payback July two thousand and five. The

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Speaker 2: evidence that the hearings in Bunderberg had been tragic, grueling

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Speaker 2: and at times gratuitously graphic. Bloody wounds, cover ups, perforated bowels, maladministration, oozing,

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Speaker 2: pass missed opportunities, all of it amid tension and uncertainty

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Speaker 2: raised by the looming Supreme Court challenge by Darren Keating

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Speaker 2: and Peter Leck. If the challenge should succeed in bringing

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Speaker 2: about the abolition of the inquiry, we feared it would

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Speaker 2: all have been for nothing. In declaring himself unbiased, Tony

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Speaker 2: Morris had made an impassioned speech about the ramifications of

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Speaker 2: his ousting.

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Speaker 1: It would, he explained.

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Speaker 3: Have very grave personal consequences for the individuals who wished

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Speaker 3: to see an outcome to this, and the thing that

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Speaker 3: presses most upon my mind is the gruesome stories that

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Speaker 3: we've heard over.

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Speaker 1: The past three or four weeks.

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Speaker 2: He omissed mention of the grave personal consequences for himself.

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Speaker 2: For most of the inquiry staff, journalists and the support crew.

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Speaker 2: It was almost time to return to families in Brisbane.

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Speaker 2: We had been based in Bunderberg for a month in

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Speaker 2: the lecture hall in the Education Center where the evidence

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Speaker 2: was being heard. Some of the reporters began planning a

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Speaker 2: fitting farewell to Bunderberg, a dinner party at the Indian

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Speaker 2: Curry Bizarre restaurant, Patel's favorite. Jane Hodgkinson, the nine network

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Speaker 2: senior reporter, showed me a list of mock awards. They

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Speaker 2: were directed mostly at the media, a few lawyers, and

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Speaker 2: the inquiry staff. We hoped they would raise a laugh

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Speaker 2: for being mentioned from time to time by Tony Morris,

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Speaker 2: who had that day referred to me as quote the

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Speaker 2: most reliable oracle quote while clarifying something I had actually misreported.

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Speaker 2: I would receive the teacher's pet gong. Sean Parnell, whose

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Speaker 2: articles in The Australian had caused Maurice Heartburn was deemed

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Speaker 2: best ghost writer for his absence from an inquiry he

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Speaker 2: kept writing about. There were a couple of gongs for

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Speaker 2: the patients, for lifting his shirt to show his wound

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Speaker 2: to journalists, and for asking the inquiry staff to post

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Speaker 2: on its official website several photographs of his swollen and

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Speaker 2: split abdomen. Ian Fleming would receive a show me Your

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Speaker 2: Wound Award, and one of our favorite patients, Beryl Crosby,

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Speaker 2: the indefatigable chain smoking leader of the support group, would

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Speaker 2: be blessed with a Dirty Ashtray Award. Jeff dem the

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Speaker 2: lawyer for Darren Keating, would be flattered by his special

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Speaker 2: mention an award for courage under fire. Similarly, John Allen,

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Speaker 2: the tough but eminently fair lawyer for the nurses, would

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Speaker 2: receive a glowing tribute. Jane Hodgkinson, together with Channel ten's

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Speaker 2: Dannie l Eisdale, Channel seven's Kathy Weiss, and myself, expanded

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Speaker 2: the list. Word of our plans to party soon reached

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Speaker 2: the Inquiry staff, who were all welcome. The affable senior

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Speaker 2: counsel assisting David Andrews was determined to make it a success.

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Speaker 2: He volunteered to bring plenty of wine before.

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Speaker 1: We left for the day.

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Speaker 2: Linda Mulligan, the hospital's former director of nursing, whose management

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Speaker 2: style was criticized by Tony Hoffman and other nurses, gave

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Speaker 2: her evidence. Tony Morris looked and sounded agitated. He regarded

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Speaker 2: Linda Mulligan's answers as unsatisfactory.

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Speaker 3: What I read in your statement is that every time

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Speaker 3: there's a problem, you give the textbook bureaucratic answer. You

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Speaker 3: need more training, you need mediation, you need skills development,

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Speaker 3: you've got communications problems. All those textbook bureaucratic answers, rather

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Speaker 3: than the natural reaction from a senior nurse, which is

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Speaker 3: to go and support her staff, see what they're saying,

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Speaker 3: provide them with the comfort they need, ascertained the facts

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Speaker 3: for herself, and dealed with a problem in a hands

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Speaker 3: on way.

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Speaker 2: Mulligan's reply that she had suggested everyone sit down together

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Speaker 2: did not plicate Morris. The next witness, George Connolly, a

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Speaker 2: white haired and frighteningly frail sixty seven year old, needed

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Speaker 2: help to reach the stand. He took small steps while

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Speaker 2: pushing along a large bottle of oxygen and other life

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Speaker 2: saving paraphernalia. Just drawing breath was an effort for Connolly,

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Speaker 2: who suffered from a collapsed lung and emphysema.

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Speaker 1: He was gravely ill.

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Speaker 2: He wanted to talk about the death of his wife,

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Speaker 2: Doreen after a hospital bungle. Morris gave the widower a

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Speaker 2: sympathetic hearing. Connolly asked to be able to say something.

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Speaker 2: In closing with great effort, the emaciated pension slowly rose

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Speaker 2: to his feet. In a rasping voice, he said.

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Speaker 4: Today and over the last weeks, we've heard a man

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Speaker 4: carry out an inquiry under enormous strain.

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Speaker 2: Connolly then raised his voice to ensure that nobody misheard.

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Speaker 2: The TV reporters knew even then that this grab would

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Speaker 2: lead their report for the Evening News.

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Speaker 4: He's been pushed by the government, He's been pushed by

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Speaker 4: everyone else under the sun. The hospital has taken him

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Speaker 4: to court and everything. I have nothing but more appreciation

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Speaker 4: for that man, mister Morris, for standing up and showing

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Speaker 4: guts and standing up and fighting our health system. And

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Speaker 4: I like everyone now to stand up put their hands

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Speaker 4: together for mister Morris.

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Speaker 2: Those in the public gallery stood and gave Morris a

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Speaker 2: rousing standing ovation. The lawyers and the journalists remain seated

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Speaker 2: out of professionalism, and Morris looked deeply touched.

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Speaker 3: Thank you, mister Connolly. We'll take a ten minute break.

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Speaker 2: After Connolly shuffled away, and news editors in Brisbane rewrote

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Speaker 2: the bulletin the hits kept coming for Linda Mulligan. Her

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Speaker 2: weighty written statement was likened by Tony Morris to a

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Speaker 2: telephone book. Mulligan's barrister, Alan mcsparan told Morris that his

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Speaker 2: questioning was objectionable.

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Speaker 5: You have entered the arena, taken an active role to

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Speaker 5: denigrate this witness and in my submission quite unfairly.

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Speaker 3: Is there any reason why I can't use appropriate forensic

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Speaker 3: resources to get at the truth?

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Speaker 5: Morris replied, well, no one is objecting to you conducting

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Speaker 5: yourself and conducting the inquiry appropriately.

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Speaker 1: Ms Boran said.

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Speaker 3: Well, mister leck Is, he's taking me to the Supreme Court.

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Speaker 2: Morris counted a few hours later at the restaurant, about

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Speaker 2: thirty five of us headed upstairs to a special table

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Speaker 2: setting organized by Pam Samra, who used to look forward

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Speaker 2: to Patel's visits there. We had most of the dining

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Speaker 2: room to ourselves. The only other diners were at a

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Speaker 2: table on the far side. About ten pm, Jane Hodgkinson

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Speaker 2: asked me to join her in announcing the mock awards.

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Speaker 2: Halfway into the announcements, the diners on the far side

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Speaker 2: arose to leave. On her way across the room, one woman,

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Speaker 2: Pat Matthews, spoke sharply. She said, oh, very nice. I'm

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Speaker 2: sure the patients would love to hear that. We groaned

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Speaker 2: when we discovered later that she was head of the

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Speaker 2: Patient Liaison service for Queensland Health. Her words had cut

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Speaker 2: the jovial atmosphere to ribbons. The banter was muted in

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Speaker 2: the hour before we headed back to our accommodation. The

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Speaker 2: next morning, David Andrews chipper as ever, despite his sore head,

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Speaker 2: joined Tony Morris and the Deputy Commissioners on a visit

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Speaker 2: to the hospital. Andrews recognized the district Manager, Monica Seth,

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Speaker 2: who had taken over from Peter Leck as the hospital's

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Speaker 2: manager in these trying times. She had been in the

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Speaker 2: group with Pat Matthews at the restaurant. On the last

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Speaker 2: day of evidence in Bunderberg. Other Queensland Health staff took

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Speaker 2: time out to visit the inquiry. They jotted notes while

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Speaker 2: scanning the public gallery to identify journalists and inquiry staff.

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Speaker 2: Then they went back to work to swear statutory affidavits

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Speaker 2: accusing us of lampooning the patients in clinical episodes involving

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Speaker 2: harm to patients. Queensland Health staff had moved like aged sloths.

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Speaker 2: They took an eternity to investigate, even where lives were

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Speaker 2: at risk. But within twelve hours of last drinks at

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Speaker 2: the Indian Curry Bazaar in Bunderberg, the acting head of

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Speaker 2: Queensland Health, doctor John Scott, was relaying to Premier Peter

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Speaker 2: Beatty a dozen Affi davits from the staff in Bunderberg.

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Speaker 2: Oblivious to the gathering storm. Many of the reporters in

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Speaker 2: the inquiry room were visibly moved by widow Tess Bramach.

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Speaker 2: She told Tony Morris and his two deputies.

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Speaker 6: The only comfort for me to let my husband and

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Speaker 6: soulmate go is to think the health system will be fixed.

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Speaker 6: I thank you on behalf of our children and all

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Speaker 6: the rest of Desmond's family.

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Speaker 2: In Brisbane, John Scott raised with Premier Peter Beatty whether

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Speaker 2: our antics at the Indian Curry Bazaar might constitute official

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Speaker 2: misconduct a criminal offense, so Beattie wrote to Robert Needham,

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Speaker 2: the head of Queensland's anti corruption body, the Crime and

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Speaker 2: Misconduct Commission. As we boarded the last flight from Bunderberg

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Speaker 2: to Brisbane that Thursday afternoon, Morris already knew that Peter

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Speaker 2: Beatty had a bee in his bonnet about the previous night.

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Speaker 2: Jane Hodgkinson and I swapped intelligence on what we had

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Speaker 2: heard might be brewing. We knew that something had been

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Speaker 2: leaked to Sean Parnell at the Australian. I felt sure

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Speaker 2: that if Parnell planned to write anything, he would call

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Speaker 2: me first to check on the claims or to seek comment.

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Speaker 1: We had been colleagues.

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Speaker 2: David Andrews was unworried as the aircraft left Bunderberg behind.

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Speaker 7: Nobody did anything wrong.

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Speaker 1: It's a nonsense.

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Speaker 2: The next morning, while reading the Australians online edition, I

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Speaker 2: see that the story that was.

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Speaker 8: Published a raucus dinner involving barristers for the so called

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Speaker 8: doctor death inquiry and journalists covering the proceedings has sparked

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Speaker 8: a scandal in the central Queensland sugartown of Bunderberg. Premier

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Speaker 8: Peter Beatty will be asked to take action over the

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Speaker 8: dinner Bunderberg's Indian Curry Bazaar, which was attended by thirty

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Speaker 8: three people and featured a mock awards ceremony. The complaints

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Speaker 8: to mister Beattie raised the prospect of an official misconduct investigation,

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Speaker 8: which could only be done by the Crime and Misconduct Commission.

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Speaker 8: The Australian has learned the barristers assisting the four million

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Speaker 8: dollar inquiry, David Andrews sc and Errol Moore Zone and

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Speaker 8: other Commission staff, were present at the dinner on Wednesday night,

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Speaker 8: on the eve of the completion of the inquiry's bunderberg sittings.

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Speaker 8: Two journalists presented a series of awards to those present

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Speaker 8: at the dinner, seemingly unaware that a group of health

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Speaker 8: staff were seated at a nearby table.

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Speaker 2: The story went on to smear the inquiry staff, none

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Speaker 2: of whom had any prior knowledge of the mock awards. Surprisingly,

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Speaker 2: none of the inquiry staff or the journalists had been

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Speaker 2: contacted for and on the record comment the angle cut

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Speaker 2: us deeply. The mock awards were poking fun at our

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Speaker 2: selves where the patients were mentioned. It was good humored

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Speaker 2: to me. The Patel story was simple negligent health system

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Speaker 2: introduces negligent surgeon to unwitting patients, resulting in very poor outcomes.

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Speaker 2: I saw Patel as part of a big picture and

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Speaker 2: the catalyst for overdue reform. Sean Parnell took a generally

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Speaker 2: contrary approach in his reporting. To his great credit, he

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Speaker 2: had identified major flaws in the conduct of Tony Morris

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Speaker 2: as inquiry had. The explanation by Sean Parnell of these

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Speaker 2: flaws was a recurring theme in his articles. But it

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Speaker 2: seemed to me that in playing Marris the man harder

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Speaker 2: than the ball, he focused less on the serious systemic

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Speaker 2: issues of the health system. This had the effect of

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Speaker 2: immunizing the political leadership and Queensland Health's chieftains. The conduct

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Speaker 2: of Marris paled into insignificance compared with the plight of

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Speaker 2: those patients unnecessarily dying or being maimed in hospitals because

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Speaker 2: of unsafe or inadequate care. The awards night triggered fast.

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Speaker 2: Beattie and his staff began to flood media outlets with

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Speaker 2: copies of the affidavits. The Premier ordered the state government

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Speaker 2: jet to go to Bunderberg to meet patient in Fleming

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Speaker 2: on the tarmac, and in one of his most repugnant

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Speaker 2: performances of two thousand and five, the politician hugged him

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Speaker 2: like a long lost brother while apologizing repeatedly.

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Speaker 1: Danny l.

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Speaker 2: Eisdale and the ABC's reporter Alex Graham, both of whom

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Speaker 2: witnessed the embrace and the platitudes, were disgusted. Fleming appeared

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Speaker 2: to be crying when Alex Graham asked Bettie at an

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Speaker 2: impromptu press conference on the airport tarmac whether his calls

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Speaker 2: for a crime and Misconduct commission inquiry, his apparent outrage,

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Speaker 2: and his use of public funds to divert the jet

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Speaker 2: to Bunderberg for the photo opportunity with it Ian Fleming

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Speaker 2: were really desperate attempts to divert attention from the crisis

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Speaker 2: plaguing his government. Betty turned on the aggression, as Alex

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Speaker 2: Graham had been at the restaurant. Beatty angrily declared to

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Speaker 2: her that she had no right to be asking him

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Speaker 2: about his responses. She showed great composure and common sense.

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Speaker 2: She turned to an ABC colleague and asked him to

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Speaker 2: repeat the question. Beattie wanted the reporters who had been

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Speaker 2: what he called ring leaders at the Awards Night banned

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Speaker 2: from covering the inquiry. He wanted me taken off this assignment.

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Speaker 2: If not fired, it was the ultimate get square. His

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Speaker 2: staff sent the affidavids to David Fagan, the editor.

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Speaker 9: Beattie thundered the major players in this shouldn't cover the

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Speaker 9: inquiry anymore.

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Speaker 2: Back in his chambers at George Street, Brisbane, Tony Morris

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Speaker 2: was almost apoplectic with fury. He had the Australian newspaper

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Speaker 2: in his sights. In a ten am media release and

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Speaker 2: a subsequent fiery media conference, the.

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Speaker 3: Story written by Sean Parnell is a monstrous beat up

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Speaker 3: and calls into serious question the author's motives, if not

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Speaker 3: his journalistic ethics and professionalism.

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Speaker 1: Morris said.

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Speaker 2: He accused Sean Parnell of acting.

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Speaker 3: As unofficial press correspondent for the senior bureaucracy at Queensland

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Speaker 3: Health and of.

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Speaker 2: Failing to consult others at the dinner to ascertain what

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Speaker 2: it was all about.

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Speaker 1: At his media.

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Speaker 2: Conference, Morris and The Australian's Queensland Bureau chief, my friend

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Speaker 2: sid Ma slugged it out. Ma, a staunch and loyal

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Speaker 2: defender of his colleague, was not going to stand by

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Speaker 2: in silence as Tony Morris continued the tirade. When sid

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Speaker 2: mar started asking Morris tough questions, the lawyer Cross examined

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Speaker 2: Sid on Parnell's actions and ethics.

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Speaker 1: It was pure theater.

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Speaker 3: I'm under no illusion that Sean Parnell is being used

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Speaker 3: by senior bureaucrats in Queensland Health to disseminate stories like this.

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Speaker 2: Beattie and his staff worked to fan the flames. It

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Speaker 2: was the first sign of dissent between the Premier and Morris,

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Speaker 2: who had not attended the infamous dinner. The Crime and

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Speaker 2: Misconduct Commission decided to leave it well alone. One of

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Speaker 2: their staff had been among the dinner party. Beryl Crosby

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Speaker 2: reckoned the awards were a harmless hoot. She knew we

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Speaker 2: were letting our hair down, and she appreciated how hard

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Speaker 2: the media had worked. She embarrassed Bettie by revealing that

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Speaker 2: she had been trying to have him visit Bunderberg to

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Speaker 2: address the victims for weeks. Yet it was the opportunity

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Speaker 2: to shoot the messengers which finally brought him to the town.

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Speaker 2: On hearing of her award, Beryl had just one request.

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Speaker 10: She asked, can I have the ash straight.

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Speaker 2: Public opinion was not with Peter Beatty. Most people saw

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Speaker 2: through the mock indignation. He let it go after a

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Speaker 2: couple of days.

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Speaker 9: I don't want to pursue the matter anymore. I've made

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Speaker 9: my point about it.

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Speaker 2: The stoush between Marris and Sean Parnell was inevitable. Conflict

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00:18:16,080 --> 00:18:20,479
Speaker 2: had been simmering for weeks. Parnell had enjoyed a close

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Speaker 2: working relationship with health chiefs over several years. He'd angered

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Speaker 2: Marris by wrongly reporting that Patel was within error rates

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Speaker 2: and that none of the discipline reaction previously taken in

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Speaker 2: the US would have prevented him doing procedures for which

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Speaker 2: he was being investigated in Australia. After one of his

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Speaker 2: reports stated that Patel was linked to, as Sean put it,

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Speaker 2: only eight deaths, Marris sarcastically mused whether a century ago

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Speaker 2: Pannell might have written.

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Speaker 3: Jack the Ripper linked with only eight deaths.

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Speaker 2: Twelve days after the infamous Awards night, Tony Morris wrote

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Speaker 2: to Buckland and pointedly condemned what he described as.

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Speaker 3: A concerted campaign of disinformation being orchestrated from within Queensland Health,

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Speaker 3: apparently designed to discredit and derailed this Commission of Inquiry

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Speaker 3: characterized by the strategic leaking of information to Sean Parnell

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Speaker 3: of The Australian.

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Speaker 2: But in most respects Parnell's reporting was courageous. He went

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Speaker 2: against popular opinion to expose serious chinks in the armor

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Speaker 2: of the inquiry chief. He pulled no punches in criticizing Morris,

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Speaker 2: who was obsessed with the media. The more that his

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Speaker 2: unorthodox handling of the inquiry was highlighted, the more tony

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Speaker 2: Morris reacted, in my view, in his zeal to please everyone,

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Speaker 2: he had jeopardized the inquiry. Meanwhile, doctor Buckland and doctor

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Speaker 2: Scott were doomed. The organization they led was in disarray.

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Speaker 2: They were at loggerheads with their minister Gordon Nutt. They

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Speaker 2: had lost Peter Beatty's confidence, and the waiting lists for

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Speaker 2: surgery in the public hospitals were growing. In late July,

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Speaker 2: Nuttle was sacked as Health Minister.

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Speaker 11: Beattie said, Minister Nuttle is of the view and I

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Speaker 11: agree with him that we need a fresh start to

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Speaker 11: enable health reform so that Queenslanders have confidence that their

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Speaker 11: health system is second to none in the world.

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Speaker 2: Buckland was axed a few days later. The state government's

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Speaker 2: top public servant, Leo Kellagher, told Steve Buckland that Beatty

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Speaker 2: no longer had confidence in him. He was given no reasons.

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Speaker 12: It is with great sadness that I let you know

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Speaker 12: I will believing Queensland Health as Director General effective at

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Speaker 12: midday to day.

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Speaker 2: Buckland told staff on twenty six July.

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Speaker 12: I'm incredibly proud of the journey we began eighteen months

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Speaker 12: ago to reform public health care.

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Speaker 2: Buckland's friend and loyal deputy John Scott was the next

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Speaker 2: to go. When the nurse Karen Jenna heard about buckland sacking,

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Speaker 2: she recalled his faithful seven April visit to the hospital

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Speaker 2: when she asked him why there would be no proper

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Speaker 2: investigation into doctor Patel, and she recalled his demeaning answer.

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Speaker 12: What part of there's going to be no inquiry? Don't

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Speaker 12: you understand?

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Speaker 2: Buckland had asked her in the crowded room that day.

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Speaker 2: Now the tables were turned. Jenna sent Steve Buckland a

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Speaker 2: message on the day he was told to clear out

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Speaker 2: his office.

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Speaker 9: What part of sacked?

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Speaker 3: Don't you understand?

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Speaker 2: My mother, Diana, had been troubled by chronic back pain

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Speaker 2: for a long time. She was losing weight and looked

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Speaker 2: pale and frail. But she soldiered on without fuss and

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Speaker 2: looked forward to another overseas jaunt she might afford only

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Speaker 2: in her dreams. On the day, the story about the

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Speaker 2: awards at the Indian restaurant in Bunderberg gave Beattie an

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Speaker 2: opportunity to call for scalps. Mum's underlying illness prompted drastic action.

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Speaker 2: It was the first indication of something serious. My older

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Speaker 2: sister Peter sent me a text message just before.

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Speaker 13: Noon Mummy is going to hospital for a lengthy stay.

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Speaker 1: She is not in good shape. Or called with more news.

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Speaker 2: Our youngest sister Kate was giving birth to her daughter

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Speaker 2: Mia in Sydney that day, and Mum was upset at

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Speaker 2: being unable to be there for the arrival of another grandchild,

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Speaker 2: her ninth. The kids called her mo, never Granny, and

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Speaker 2: if you knew my mother you would understand why she

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Speaker 2: saw herself as being more youthful than her own four children.

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Speaker 2: In some ways. She was a tall, beautiful and still

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Speaker 2: willowy blonde. She carried herself proudly in the latest designer

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Speaker 2: ripped denims or an expensive Italian suit. Hospital gowns were

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Speaker 2: not for her. In her sixties, she had taken herself

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Speaker 2: off to Italy, where she spent a year learning the

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Speaker 2: language and immersing herself in village life. She was admitted

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Speaker 2: to award on the eighth floor at the Gold Coast

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Speaker 2: Hospital after her heart specialist expressed alarm at worsening symptoms.

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Speaker 2: Mum was gasping for breath, her pulse raised, her back

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Speaker 2: pain had become excruciating. I can't believe that you are

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00:23:22,240 --> 00:23:26,679
Speaker 2: still walking around, the specialist told her, as Mum rolled

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Speaker 2: her eyes at being moved from floor to floor in

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Speaker 2: the overcrowded public hospital and gossiped with my younger sister

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Speaker 2: Rebecca and leafed through power of Positive Thinking books. The

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Speaker 2: doctor's rantesse the elevator carried a notice warning patients and

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Speaker 2: visitors that unfair criticism and racist slurs against the hospital's

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Speaker 2: overseas trained doctors would not be tolerated. They had been

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Speaker 2: copying a hard time since the Petel scandal erupted. The

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Speaker 2: doctor's new Mum had stomach ulcers and an internal bleed,

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Speaker 2: but there was something else, a tumor. It was on

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Speaker 2: her adreamal gland, silently squeezing life from a woman who

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Speaker 2: at sixty five still had Grand Plans Chapter sixty five

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Speaker 2: on the bench. Early August two thousand and five, Martin moynihan,

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Speaker 2: the Supreme Court justice with the unenviable task of determining

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Speaker 2: if the Morris Inquiry needed euthanizing, corrective surgery or a

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Speaker 2: clean bill of health, dropped a few clues to his

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Speaker 2: views during three days of legal argument in Brisbane. If

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Speaker 2: Tony Morris were dumped, moynihan mused, the victims of PTEL

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Speaker 2: and a sick system might have to go through another

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Speaker 2: painful legal process.

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Speaker 14: Well, the fact is what happened was devastating for them,

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Speaker 14: and to have to repeat it would be even more devastating,

381
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Speaker 14: he said.

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Speaker 2: Senior lawyers told me that Martin moynihan would not be

383
00:25:10,440 --> 00:25:14,360
Speaker 2: influenced by the public and political support for Tony Morris.

384
00:25:14,920 --> 00:25:18,480
Speaker 2: The experienced judge looked forward to retirement and had nothing

385
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Speaker 2: to gain or lose from whatever he pronounced. His judgment

386
00:25:22,760 --> 00:25:27,440
Speaker 2: on Morris would be his most momentous. His bushy eyebrows

387
00:25:27,600 --> 00:25:30,960
Speaker 2: arched as he read portions of transcript from the inquiry,

388
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Speaker 2: pressing the advantage for Peter Leck and Darren Keating were

389
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Speaker 2: two of the more experienced Brisbane lawyers that money could

390
00:25:38,440 --> 00:25:44,480
Speaker 2: buy David Jackson QC and Robert Mulholland QC. They characterized

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00:25:44,520 --> 00:25:48,600
Speaker 2: Morris as a sarcastic and unfair bully who had two

392
00:25:48,680 --> 00:25:54,399
Speaker 2: categories of witnesses, heroes and villains, white hats and black hats.

393
00:25:56,240 --> 00:25:59,760
Speaker 2: Moynihan was taken to two passages from the record of

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Speaker 2: the questioning by Morris. The interrogation was likened to a

395
00:26:04,520 --> 00:26:09,919
Speaker 2: laceration in lex case and an ambush in Keatings. Tony

396
00:26:09,960 --> 00:26:10,920
Speaker 2: Morris had.

397
00:26:10,760 --> 00:26:15,080
Speaker 3: Said doctor Meek was a doctor who actually deals with patients,

398
00:26:15,160 --> 00:26:17,879
Speaker 3: not a bureaucrat. Would it be a good start to

399
00:26:17,960 --> 00:26:21,000
Speaker 3: have hospitals run by doctors who are real doctors?

400
00:26:22,400 --> 00:26:25,360
Speaker 14: More in a hand commented, Well, they're not questions, really

401
00:26:25,400 --> 00:26:29,080
Speaker 14: are they They're assertions which the witness has little room

402
00:26:29,119 --> 00:26:32,840
Speaker 14: to maneuver in terms of accepting or rejecting. I mean,

403
00:26:32,960 --> 00:26:35,360
Speaker 14: in the circumstances in which he's found himself.

404
00:26:36,320 --> 00:26:39,960
Speaker 1: Robert mul holland said, yes, it's really abuse.

405
00:26:40,040 --> 00:26:43,840
Speaker 3: We'd say, at the very least, your honor, it's grossly discourteous.

406
00:26:44,880 --> 00:26:48,320
Speaker 2: Thanks to the decision of Morris to permit cameras into

407
00:26:48,359 --> 00:26:52,159
Speaker 2: the inquiry, Peterleck and Darren Keating had the benefit of

408
00:26:52,400 --> 00:26:57,920
Speaker 2: DVDs obtained under subpoena from the TV stations. The footage

409
00:26:57,960 --> 00:27:02,119
Speaker 2: provided glimpses of the hostility Morris at times showed. It

410
00:27:02,280 --> 00:27:06,760
Speaker 2: featured him shaking Hoffman's hand, a moment described by David

411
00:27:06,840 --> 00:27:12,680
Speaker 2: Jackson as almost surreal. The pictures painted a thousand words

412
00:27:13,040 --> 00:27:16,119
Speaker 2: hundreds of black and white pages of transcript were not

413
00:27:16,200 --> 00:27:20,240
Speaker 2: as powerful as one or two DVDs. For Leck and

414
00:27:20,440 --> 00:27:23,840
Speaker 2: Keithing to succeed in their bid to kill the inquiry,

415
00:27:24,280 --> 00:27:27,879
Speaker 2: their lawyers needed to persuade the judge that a hypothetical

416
00:27:27,920 --> 00:27:33,000
Speaker 2: observer sitting in the inquiry room would have reasonably concluded

417
00:27:33,040 --> 00:27:38,280
Speaker 2: that Tony Morris had already formed prejudicial views. There had

418
00:27:38,320 --> 00:27:43,399
Speaker 2: to be an apprehension of bias. Fighting for Morris, the

419
00:27:43,400 --> 00:27:48,040
Speaker 2: Solicitor General, Walter Sofronoff, QC stressed that the proceedings were,

420
00:27:48,200 --> 00:27:53,520
Speaker 2: by their very nature inquisitorial, and Morris could ask tough

421
00:27:53,600 --> 00:27:58,600
Speaker 2: questions as he saw fit. Royal commission style inquiries bare

422
00:27:58,720 --> 00:28:03,600
Speaker 2: little resemblance to the usual judicial process. Inquiry commissioners are

423
00:28:03,640 --> 00:28:07,960
Speaker 2: not bound by usual rules. Their witnesses may not refuse

424
00:28:08,040 --> 00:28:08,800
Speaker 2: to give evidence.

425
00:28:10,080 --> 00:28:12,480
Speaker 15: It is one of the weapons in the arsenal of

426
00:28:12,520 --> 00:28:15,879
Speaker 15: a truth finder to be at liberty to call somebody

427
00:28:15,920 --> 00:28:21,200
Speaker 15: on short notice or no notice, and certainly in circumstances

428
00:28:21,240 --> 00:28:25,000
Speaker 15: where that person is not expecting to be called, in

429
00:28:25,160 --> 00:28:30,640
Speaker 15: order to establish facts before false propositions can be cobbled.

430
00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:37,439
Speaker 2: Together, Sofronov said. Accordingly, Walter Sofronoff argued a commissioner like

431
00:28:37,560 --> 00:28:41,880
Speaker 2: Tony Morris was at perfect liberty to call somebody without notice,

432
00:28:42,200 --> 00:28:46,040
Speaker 2: however upsetting it might have been to the witnesses. If

433
00:28:46,040 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 2: he could have had a bet on the result, the

434
00:28:48,360 --> 00:28:53,160
Speaker 2: Courier Male's longtime court reporter, inveterate hunter Mark Oberhart would

435
00:28:53,160 --> 00:28:57,360
Speaker 2: have put money on disqualification. Others were not so sure.

436
00:28:58,480 --> 00:29:01,440
Speaker 9: We didn't start this course action to have it aborted

437
00:29:01,560 --> 00:29:05,400
Speaker 9: halfway through this inquiry will finish its work.

438
00:29:05,960 --> 00:29:07,000
Speaker 1: Peter Beatty said.

439
00:29:10,640 --> 00:29:15,600
Speaker 2: Tony Morris remained the preferred commissioner, but Beatte vowed a

440
00:29:15,720 --> 00:29:18,960
Speaker 2: new inquiry would pick up where Morris had left off

441
00:29:19,240 --> 00:29:23,000
Speaker 2: if he were ousted. The pressure on all the parties

442
00:29:23,200 --> 00:29:28,040
Speaker 2: was relentless as the Supreme Court challenge droned on. Tony

443
00:29:28,120 --> 00:29:31,800
Speaker 2: Morris conducted hearings in earshot of the din of money

444
00:29:31,840 --> 00:29:34,400
Speaker 2: being won and lost in the poker machines, and on

445
00:29:34,440 --> 00:29:38,200
Speaker 2: the card tables that the towns will breakwater casino. He

446
00:29:38,280 --> 00:29:41,680
Speaker 2: had brought the inquiry to North Queensland for three days

447
00:29:41,680 --> 00:29:45,680
Speaker 2: of hearings. At the breaks when he chain smoked quickly

448
00:29:45,840 --> 00:29:49,960
Speaker 2: and deeply, he was anxious for news. He was gambling

449
00:29:49,960 --> 00:29:55,400
Speaker 2: on a major legal triumph. What's the gossip? Tony repeatedly asked.

450
00:29:55,840 --> 00:29:58,880
Speaker 2: He was keen for any indication of how things were

451
00:29:58,920 --> 00:30:02,520
Speaker 2: panning out in Brisbane. At one stage he quipped that

452
00:30:02,560 --> 00:30:04,320
Speaker 2: Walter Sofronoff had told.

453
00:30:04,120 --> 00:30:07,720
Speaker 15: Him, don't be making plans to give up your day

454
00:30:07,840 --> 00:30:08,920
Speaker 15: job just yet.

455
00:30:10,520 --> 00:30:15,440
Speaker 2: Morris seemed emboldened, and the sensational evidence in Townsville was

456
00:30:15,480 --> 00:30:18,360
Speaker 2: set to breathe new life into an inquiry that looked

457
00:30:18,400 --> 00:30:38,200
Speaker 2: like it might totter. Chapter sixty six, Secrets and Lies,

458
00:30:38,440 --> 00:30:40,040
Speaker 2: August two thousand and five.

459
00:30:43,920 --> 00:30:45,000
Speaker 1: In the Wards and.

460
00:30:44,960 --> 00:30:49,240
Speaker 2: The Staff Rooom at Townsville Hospital, Doctor Vincent Berg had

461
00:30:49,240 --> 00:30:53,360
Speaker 2: sometimes spoken of his colorful past in the former USSR

462
00:30:53,920 --> 00:30:57,200
Speaker 2: and his lofty status as a bishop in the Russian

463
00:30:57,360 --> 00:31:03,960
Speaker 2: Orthodox Church. The man known as Victor Vladimirovitch Cheqeline had

464
00:31:04,000 --> 00:31:08,520
Speaker 2: appeared concerned, almost paranoid about the tentacles of the Russian

465
00:31:08,600 --> 00:31:14,040
Speaker 2: KGB and its covert successors. They had dogged him, he explained,

466
00:31:14,240 --> 00:31:19,840
Speaker 2: with relentless surveillance and interrogation operations. But for about two

467
00:31:19,960 --> 00:31:25,080
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty patients with psychiatric issues, Berg, the hospital's

468
00:31:25,240 --> 00:31:29,680
Speaker 2: eccentric psychiatric registrar, was the person to whom they turned

469
00:31:29,720 --> 00:31:34,640
Speaker 2: for help, and he held a lawful authority to prescribe powerful,

470
00:31:34,840 --> 00:31:39,200
Speaker 2: mood altering medication. He had assessed the mental condition of

471
00:31:39,240 --> 00:31:43,560
Speaker 2: the patients after listening to their fears and frustrations. He

472
00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,640
Speaker 2: had told them how they should and could be feeling.

473
00:31:47,000 --> 00:31:50,040
Speaker 2: He had dealt on a daily basis with fragile people

474
00:31:50,120 --> 00:31:53,880
Speaker 2: whose anxieties could cause them to self mutilate with knives

475
00:31:53,960 --> 00:31:57,400
Speaker 2: or attempt suicide by walking in front of speeding cars.

476
00:31:58,440 --> 00:32:02,920
Speaker 2: Berg had his own unus usual ideas and practices. When

477
00:32:02,960 --> 00:32:06,840
Speaker 2: he visited patients at their homes, he appeared more interested

478
00:32:06,880 --> 00:32:12,040
Speaker 2: in the children, particularly young boys. Medication had calmed the

479
00:32:12,120 --> 00:32:16,080
Speaker 2: violent tendencies of one of the patients who had committed murder.

480
00:32:16,640 --> 00:32:20,800
Speaker 2: Berg took him off the pills. Berg told other patients

481
00:32:20,800 --> 00:32:24,640
Speaker 2: who were clearly mentally ill, that they were perfectly fine.

482
00:32:24,680 --> 00:32:30,080
Speaker 2: He overruled senior psychiatrists by significantly changing their treatment plans

483
00:32:31,040 --> 00:32:34,400
Speaker 2: as far as the patients knew. However, Berg was a

484
00:32:34,480 --> 00:32:38,600
Speaker 2: Queensland Health employee registered by the Medical Board to deal

485
00:32:38,640 --> 00:32:44,360
Speaker 2: with a range of serious psychiatric illnesses. Psychiatric patients who

486
00:32:44,400 --> 00:32:48,520
Speaker 2: complained that their psychiatrist is weird are not, as a rule,

487
00:32:48,880 --> 00:32:54,120
Speaker 2: taken very seriously. When Jared Cary Grimmond, one of the

488
00:32:54,200 --> 00:32:57,400
Speaker 2: lawyers seconded to the Morris inquiry to run behind the

489
00:32:57,440 --> 00:33:02,360
Speaker 2: scenes investigations and interviews, went to Townsville to follow several leads,

490
00:33:02,720 --> 00:33:06,760
Speaker 2: he was told about the Berg file. It had been

491
00:33:06,920 --> 00:33:10,720
Speaker 2: concealed by Queensland Health and the Medical Board since early

492
00:33:10,760 --> 00:33:15,320
Speaker 2: two thousand and three. As the comprehensive file showed, Berg

493
00:33:15,520 --> 00:33:18,240
Speaker 2: was not even qualified to replace bandages.

494
00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:21,000
Speaker 1: He had crudely.

495
00:33:20,560 --> 00:33:24,840
Speaker 2: Forged paperwork to purport that he had done extensive training

496
00:33:25,440 --> 00:33:28,920
Speaker 2: at Voronesh University in the former USSR.

497
00:33:29,560 --> 00:33:31,080
Speaker 1: He was a total fake.

498
00:33:32,040 --> 00:33:36,120
Speaker 2: In all probability, his mental problems were more serious than

499
00:33:36,160 --> 00:33:39,920
Speaker 2: those of many of his patients. His true form of

500
00:33:40,040 --> 00:33:44,520
Speaker 2: vocation as a school teacher in the USSR, had ended

501
00:33:44,760 --> 00:33:49,360
Speaker 2: years earlier, Despite having no experience or training in medicine

502
00:33:49,440 --> 00:33:52,880
Speaker 2: or psychiatry. He had been given a green light by

503
00:33:52,920 --> 00:33:56,240
Speaker 2: the Medical Board and a job with Queensland Health to

504
00:33:56,320 --> 00:34:01,920
Speaker 2: treat the community's most vulnerable people. The evidence in Townsville

505
00:34:02,040 --> 00:34:05,920
Speaker 2: was devastating. It showed that the Board had been worn

506
00:34:06,040 --> 00:34:09,640
Speaker 2: by the Australian Medical Council and the Royal Australian and

507
00:34:09,719 --> 00:34:14,320
Speaker 2: New Zealand College of Psychiatrists that Berg's documents were quote

508
00:34:14,640 --> 00:34:20,520
Speaker 2: crude forgeries end quote. The Board did next to nothing

509
00:34:20,600 --> 00:34:25,400
Speaker 2: after receiving these written warnings. It did not advise Townsville Hospital,

510
00:34:25,760 --> 00:34:30,200
Speaker 2: nor did its start a prosecution. Instead, the Board's Deputy,

511
00:34:30,600 --> 00:34:35,320
Speaker 2: Michael Demi Guerau, issued a qualified Certificate of good Standing

512
00:34:35,400 --> 00:34:39,440
Speaker 2: to Burg, who used it to seek jobs elsewhere. He

513
00:34:39,520 --> 00:34:43,799
Speaker 2: pitched his bogus CV to a hospital in India, he

514
00:34:43,880 --> 00:34:47,280
Speaker 2: almost landed a job in the Northern Territory and New Zealand.

515
00:34:48,280 --> 00:34:51,600
Speaker 2: On the information available to Queensland Health and the Board,

516
00:34:51,760 --> 00:34:55,600
Speaker 2: Berg had committed a string of criminal offenses, from fraud

517
00:34:55,840 --> 00:35:00,120
Speaker 2: to assault, yet he was permitted to slip quietly away.

518
00:35:00,760 --> 00:35:04,760
Speaker 2: Morris had a question for Townsville Hospitals Medical Services Director

519
00:35:05,120 --> 00:35:06,440
Speaker 2: doctor Andrew Johnson.

520
00:35:07,280 --> 00:35:09,879
Speaker 3: He was applausible, rogue and.

521
00:35:09,920 --> 00:35:13,680
Speaker 16: Johnson replied, yes, you know, basically a con man.

522
00:35:14,840 --> 00:35:19,680
Speaker 2: When Johnson first discovered by accident the embarrassing truth about Berg,

523
00:35:20,000 --> 00:35:23,120
Speaker 2: the Russian refugee had already left the hospital due to

524
00:35:23,200 --> 00:35:27,399
Speaker 2: his lamentable lack of knowledge about psychiatry, but he had

525
00:35:27,480 --> 00:35:32,360
Speaker 2: lasted a year there. Johnson crafted a comprehensive strategy to

526
00:35:32,440 --> 00:35:36,759
Speaker 2: alert Berg's patients and come clean with the public. He

527
00:35:36,800 --> 00:35:40,920
Speaker 2: proposed an audit of the patients and hotlines for anyone

528
00:35:41,040 --> 00:35:46,920
Speaker 2: seeking urgent counseling. Media advisers in Townsville drafted media releases.

529
00:35:47,560 --> 00:35:51,520
Speaker 2: Draft parliamentary speeches were also written for the then Health

530
00:35:51,560 --> 00:35:56,160
Speaker 2: Minister Wendy Edmund, who was sent a briefing paper saying.

531
00:35:56,760 --> 00:36:01,160
Speaker 17: Many clinical staff maintain that there exists an obligation on

532
00:36:01,239 --> 00:36:04,880
Speaker 17: Queensland Health to inform patients that they have been receiving

533
00:36:04,920 --> 00:36:07,959
Speaker 17: care from a person whose qualifications to provide that care

534
00:36:08,280 --> 00:36:11,600
Speaker 17: have been found to be invalid. There are a number

535
00:36:11,640 --> 00:36:14,440
Speaker 17: of patients and their families in the audit who have

536
00:36:14,560 --> 00:36:19,879
Speaker 17: quite sensitive psychiatric, medical and social situations. Although informing them

537
00:36:19,880 --> 00:36:22,480
Speaker 17: of these issues may make them more anxious, there are

538
00:36:22,480 --> 00:36:25,239
Speaker 17: many such patients who would feel that not informing them

539
00:36:25,360 --> 00:36:28,360
Speaker 17: was a breach of their rights and our responsibilities.

540
00:36:30,440 --> 00:36:34,200
Speaker 2: On twenty four January two thousand and three, shortly before

541
00:36:34,239 --> 00:36:38,040
Speaker 2: the plan was to have been achieved, Steve Buckland sent

542
00:36:38,160 --> 00:36:42,440
Speaker 2: a strictly confidential email to Terry Meehan, the senior manager

543
00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:44,280
Speaker 2: in Townsville for Queensland Health.

544
00:36:45,080 --> 00:36:48,520
Speaker 12: Our issue is about the quality of performance. In discussions

545
00:36:48,520 --> 00:36:50,640
Speaker 12: with the board, they refuse to acknowledge that he was

546
00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:54,640
Speaker 12: not registerable game, set and match. Therefore there is no

547
00:36:54,680 --> 00:36:56,680
Speaker 12: official misconduct and no need to report.

548
00:36:58,160 --> 00:37:01,839
Speaker 2: Johnson believed that if he spoke again, his job might

549
00:37:01,880 --> 00:37:06,640
Speaker 2: be at risk. As Johnson subsequently told Tony Morris.

550
00:37:07,200 --> 00:37:09,719
Speaker 16: Certainly at that time, bringing bad news was never a

551
00:37:09,719 --> 00:37:12,080
Speaker 16: good thing. I felt that there was a push to

552
00:37:12,160 --> 00:37:16,560
Speaker 16: ensure that Queensland Health was kept off the front page.

553
00:37:16,600 --> 00:37:20,480
Speaker 2: The conduct of the Board and Queensland Health was I

554
00:37:20,560 --> 00:37:25,640
Speaker 2: believed unforgivable. They had concealed the Burg matter in two

555
00:37:25,719 --> 00:37:28,840
Speaker 2: thousand and three, and they had concealed it from the

556
00:37:28,920 --> 00:37:32,520
Speaker 2: inquiry in two thousand and five, and it would have

557
00:37:32,600 --> 00:37:35,800
Speaker 2: remained a secret if not for the efforts of Jared

558
00:37:35,920 --> 00:37:37,280
Speaker 2: Cowley Grimmond.

559
00:37:38,080 --> 00:37:41,000
Speaker 3: Over three months of evidence. Now we see again and

560
00:37:41,080 --> 00:37:45,239
Speaker 3: again cases of Queensland Health getting reports about problems here

561
00:37:45,280 --> 00:37:48,000
Speaker 3: and problems there. And I just wonder if you can

562
00:37:48,040 --> 00:37:51,840
Speaker 3: see any logical justification for the culture that seems to

563
00:37:51,880 --> 00:37:56,080
Speaker 3: be pervasive, at least to Charlotte Street. If it's bad news,

564
00:37:56,120 --> 00:37:58,319
Speaker 3: you hide it away in the basement and never tell

565
00:37:58,360 --> 00:37:59,200
Speaker 3: anyone about it.

566
00:38:00,239 --> 00:38:03,480
Speaker 16: Commissioner, I think this is a very simple answer, and

567
00:38:03,520 --> 00:38:06,440
Speaker 16: that's the fact that politics has really taken over the

568
00:38:06,480 --> 00:38:10,640
Speaker 16: delivery of healthcare to an unreasonable extent. You know, the

569
00:38:10,680 --> 00:38:13,719
Speaker 16: reason that we're being prevented from saying things is, essentially,

570
00:38:14,000 --> 00:38:18,600
Speaker 16: I would suggest, for political purposes. No politician likes to

571
00:38:18,640 --> 00:38:21,160
Speaker 16: have bad news on their watch. The only reason that

572
00:38:21,200 --> 00:38:24,279
Speaker 16: I can think of for suppressing information is for short

573
00:38:24,400 --> 00:38:26,879
Speaker 16: term political advantage.

574
00:38:27,160 --> 00:38:31,320
Speaker 2: Steve Buckland and his health minister Wendy Edmund later relied

575
00:38:31,400 --> 00:38:34,600
Speaker 2: on an opinion taken at the time from a senior

576
00:38:34,680 --> 00:38:38,399
Speaker 2: Queensland health psychiatrist who advised that it could have been

577
00:38:38,480 --> 00:38:41,920
Speaker 2: harmful to the patients to learn the truth about Berg.

578
00:38:42,920 --> 00:38:46,920
Speaker 2: It was an apparently compelling defense, but my experiences with

579
00:38:47,040 --> 00:38:51,600
Speaker 2: Buckland and Edmund influenced my view that their overriding concern

580
00:38:51,880 --> 00:38:56,160
Speaker 2: was less altruistic. Quite simply, it would have been harmful

581
00:38:56,239 --> 00:38:59,200
Speaker 2: to Edmund and the Beatty government for the public to

582
00:38:59,280 --> 00:39:03,600
Speaker 2: learn the terrible truth about Berg. It angered me that

583
00:39:03,719 --> 00:39:07,120
Speaker 2: in early two thousand and three, several months before the

584
00:39:07,280 --> 00:39:11,640
Speaker 2: arrival of j Patel, the Medical Board and Queensland Health

585
00:39:11,680 --> 00:39:14,840
Speaker 2: were aware that they had been duped, yet they failed

586
00:39:14,840 --> 00:39:19,160
Speaker 2: to improve the abysmal systems to screen applicants from overseas

587
00:39:19,680 --> 00:39:23,280
Speaker 2: when they were seeking jobs as medical practitioners in Australia.

588
00:39:24,200 --> 00:39:27,799
Speaker 2: The editorial in The Courier male newspaper summed it up.

589
00:39:29,120 --> 00:39:32,319
Speaker 18: Just as it seems Queenslanders may be inured to yet

590
00:39:32,360 --> 00:39:36,080
Speaker 18: more tales of cover up and obfuscation emanating from the

591
00:39:36,160 --> 00:39:40,000
Speaker 18: upper echelons of the health bureaucracy. Along comes a fresh

592
00:39:40,040 --> 00:39:43,840
Speaker 18: scandal involving people suffering at the hands of a bogus doctor.

593
00:39:44,480 --> 00:39:47,360
Speaker 18: For many following the course of the Commission of inquiry,

594
00:39:47,719 --> 00:39:51,040
Speaker 18: it would be tempting. Indeed, it is preferable for some

595
00:39:51,120 --> 00:39:54,000
Speaker 18: in the Beta government to focus on the wrongdoing of

596
00:39:54,080 --> 00:39:57,880
Speaker 18: these rogue practitioners and not bother too much with questions

597
00:39:57,920 --> 00:40:01,040
Speaker 18: about the system that set them loose on the hospital floor.

598
00:40:01,640 --> 00:40:04,520
Speaker 18: But this would say from proper scrutiny, the culture of

599
00:40:04,680 --> 00:40:08,360
Speaker 18: arrogance and secrecy that continues to thrive within the senior

600
00:40:08,440 --> 00:40:11,440
Speaker 18: ranks of the health bureaucracy, and which has done so

601
00:40:11,560 --> 00:40:15,840
Speaker 18: much to damage the public reputation of the state's health system.

602
00:40:16,080 --> 00:40:20,560
Speaker 18: Queensland hospital workers, the doctors, nurses and clinicians who deal

603
00:40:20,600 --> 00:40:24,400
Speaker 18: with the public every day, are by and large performing

604
00:40:24,480 --> 00:40:29,160
Speaker 18: well under extremely trying circumstances. Their actions did not produce

605
00:40:29,200 --> 00:40:33,399
Speaker 18: the likes of Jayant Patel or Victor Burg. Rather, these

606
00:40:33,440 --> 00:40:36,840
Speaker 18: outrages were the fault of the senior health bureaucracy and

607
00:40:36,920 --> 00:40:40,560
Speaker 18: successive health ministries, both of which have for some years

608
00:40:40,640 --> 00:40:45,479
Speaker 18: valued political machinations and economic wrongheadedness over patient care.

609
00:40:46,840 --> 00:40:50,359
Speaker 2: I asked Philippa Harris, who was the coordinator of the

610
00:40:50,400 --> 00:40:56,120
Speaker 2: Townsville based North Queensland Mental Illness Fellowship her opinion. She

611
00:40:56,200 --> 00:41:00,279
Speaker 2: said Queensland Health, which partly funded her organization, had.

612
00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:05,160
Speaker 13: Been absolutely neglectful and irresponsible. We are gobsmacked by what

613
00:41:05,239 --> 00:41:08,160
Speaker 13: has come out and distressed that Queensland Health chose not

614
00:41:08,200 --> 00:41:11,040
Speaker 13: to act in a public interest, particularly when the local

615
00:41:11,080 --> 00:41:12,720
Speaker 13: managers wanted it out in the open.

616
00:41:13,760 --> 00:41:17,520
Speaker 2: There was something else about it that bore striking similarities

617
00:41:17,560 --> 00:41:22,239
Speaker 2: to the Patel case. Berg's personnel file was adorned with

618
00:41:22,480 --> 00:41:28,040
Speaker 2: glowing references. Doctor Brian Boecher, a mental health director for

619
00:41:28,160 --> 00:41:30,799
Speaker 2: Queensland Health, wrote this of Berg.

620
00:41:31,600 --> 00:41:35,960
Speaker 19: He clearly has considerable experience in psychiatry. I believe he

621
00:41:35,960 --> 00:41:39,160
Speaker 19: has much to teach us about psychiatry as performed in

622
00:41:39,200 --> 00:41:42,600
Speaker 19: Europe and it would be a considerable loss if people

623
00:41:42,680 --> 00:41:47,319
Speaker 19: such as him are not recognized as specialist psychiatrists in Australia.

624
00:41:47,719 --> 00:41:50,239
Speaker 19: With his very considerable experience.

625
00:41:51,280 --> 00:41:57,360
Speaker 2: Another senior psychiatrist from the organization, doctor Leon Petchkovsky, wrote.

626
00:41:58,320 --> 00:42:00,359
Speaker 7: It should be said that he is an a man

627
00:42:00,440 --> 00:42:04,400
Speaker 7: of the highest possible standards of integrity, tried in the

628
00:42:04,440 --> 00:42:08,640
Speaker 7: fires of life. He is an experienced and trusted colleague

629
00:42:08,960 --> 00:42:12,440
Speaker 7: and I have no hesitation in recommending him for any

630
00:42:12,560 --> 00:42:15,040
Speaker 7: consultant level posting he might apply for.

631
00:42:18,640 --> 00:42:23,320
Speaker 2: Russell Grenning was incredulous when we spoke during the Townswell hearings.

632
00:42:23,680 --> 00:42:27,600
Speaker 2: A former top political and media adviser, he followed the

633
00:42:27,640 --> 00:42:32,399
Speaker 2: fortunes of governments with keen interest. His sage advice had

634
00:42:32,480 --> 00:42:37,000
Speaker 2: helped Jobi Occypedason's corrupt government remain in power in Queensland

635
00:42:37,080 --> 00:42:39,200
Speaker 2: until it was thrown out in the wake of the

636
00:42:39,239 --> 00:42:44,239
Speaker 2: Fitzgerald inquiry. Grenning was now safely ensconced at the Law

637
00:42:44,320 --> 00:42:48,360
Speaker 2: Society of Queensland, where he rubbed shoulders with judges and lawyers,

638
00:42:48,920 --> 00:42:51,440
Speaker 2: and he could see the Beaty government going the same

639
00:42:51,480 --> 00:42:53,600
Speaker 2: way as the bioccypedisan government.

640
00:42:55,080 --> 00:42:58,640
Speaker 3: Honestly, there are some stories so bizarre, so incredible that

641
00:42:58,760 --> 00:42:59,680
Speaker 3: you couldn't make them up.

642
00:43:00,280 --> 00:43:02,560
Speaker 4: But every day they're coming out of the inquiry and

643
00:43:02,600 --> 00:43:05,000
Speaker 4: we're hearing them and seeing them on the six PM news.

644
00:43:05,560 --> 00:43:07,000
Speaker 1: It is politically devastating.

645
00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:25,600
Speaker 2: Chapter sixty seven, The Long Wait August two thousand and five,

646
00:43:28,040 --> 00:43:32,040
Speaker 2: Starting with the victor Burg scandal. August saw a flood

647
00:43:32,040 --> 00:43:36,000
Speaker 2: of damning revelations which caused massive political damage and led

648
00:43:36,040 --> 00:43:39,560
Speaker 2: to pleas from medical staff and the public for a

649
00:43:39,600 --> 00:43:44,520
Speaker 2: complete overhaul of the health system. Having cracked the psychiatrist's

650
00:43:44,520 --> 00:43:48,800
Speaker 2: cover up the health inquiries, lawyer come investigator Jared Cowy

651
00:43:48,880 --> 00:43:54,080
Speaker 2: Grimmond began to unravel Queensland's public hospital waiting lists. Premier

652
00:43:54,120 --> 00:43:57,560
Speaker 2: Peter Beatty had for years pointed to these lists as

653
00:43:57,680 --> 00:44:00,880
Speaker 2: proof that Queensland has enjoyed one of the world's finest

654
00:44:00,880 --> 00:44:05,080
Speaker 2: health systems. People spent less time on these lists awaiting

655
00:44:05,160 --> 00:44:09,160
Speaker 2: surgery in Queensland. He boasted than in any other state,

656
00:44:09,920 --> 00:44:12,879
Speaker 2: but for years doctors had been telling me and other

657
00:44:12,960 --> 00:44:18,919
Speaker 2: journalists the reverse. They insisted that the political boasts were untruthful.

658
00:44:19,840 --> 00:44:23,760
Speaker 2: Before patients who needed surgery, such as a cataract operation

659
00:44:24,160 --> 00:44:27,200
Speaker 2: or a hip replacement, could make it onto the official

660
00:44:27,239 --> 00:44:31,720
Speaker 2: published waiting lists, they had to graduate from another waiting list.

661
00:44:32,280 --> 00:44:37,680
Speaker 2: This was an undisclosed list, as doctor David Malloy, the

662
00:44:37,719 --> 00:44:41,640
Speaker 2: head of the Australian Medical Association in Queensland, had told

663
00:44:41,719 --> 00:44:45,799
Speaker 2: Tony Morris in the second week of the inquiry, patients

664
00:44:45,840 --> 00:44:49,200
Speaker 2: could remain on the concealed lists for as long as

665
00:44:49,360 --> 00:44:53,960
Speaker 2: eight years, but the public only ever saw or heard

666
00:44:54,040 --> 00:44:57,239
Speaker 2: about the much shorter waiting lists of those people who

667
00:44:57,280 --> 00:45:05,160
Speaker 2: were booked in for surgery. Having finally seen specialist. Premier Beatty,

668
00:45:05,520 --> 00:45:09,760
Speaker 2: his former health Minister Wendy Edmund and her successor Gordon

669
00:45:09,840 --> 00:45:13,920
Speaker 2: Nuttle had always been aware of the other lists, but

670
00:45:14,080 --> 00:45:17,160
Speaker 2: they ensured that members of the public were given figures

671
00:45:17,200 --> 00:45:21,680
Speaker 2: only from the shorter lists, and Beatty confidently asserted a

672
00:45:21,719 --> 00:45:24,520
Speaker 2: few weeks after David Malloy's evidence.

673
00:45:25,000 --> 00:45:27,680
Speaker 9: Not only are our waiting times the shortest, but we

674
00:45:27,719 --> 00:45:31,759
Speaker 9: are admitting more patients into our hospitals for treatment than

675
00:45:31,880 --> 00:45:32,640
Speaker 9: anyone else.

676
00:45:33,880 --> 00:45:37,880
Speaker 2: The campaign of deceit was undone when the secret lists

677
00:45:38,040 --> 00:45:43,360
Speaker 2: were unearthed by Jared Cowley Grimmond. Confidential Queensland Health documents

678
00:45:43,360 --> 00:45:46,640
Speaker 2: showed that more than one hundred and eight thousand people

679
00:45:47,040 --> 00:45:51,920
Speaker 2: across twenty nine regions statewide were waiting for an appointment

680
00:45:52,000 --> 00:45:55,680
Speaker 2: to see the specialist at a public hospital. They were

681
00:45:55,719 --> 00:45:59,120
Speaker 2: on the concealed lists that the Betty government had not

682
00:45:59,280 --> 00:46:05,080
Speaker 2: previously knowledge in public displays of breast beating, Queensland had

683
00:46:05,120 --> 00:46:08,840
Speaker 2: a public health system unable to meet demand and stretched

684
00:46:08,960 --> 00:46:13,279
Speaker 2: well beyond its capacity, yet for years the politicians had

685
00:46:13,400 --> 00:46:18,440
Speaker 2: hidden the evidence. Morris drew an analogy between Queensland Health's

686
00:46:18,480 --> 00:46:21,279
Speaker 2: waiting lists and fashion swimwear.

687
00:46:22,120 --> 00:46:25,800
Speaker 3: There's no interest in speed or comfort, or protection or safety.

688
00:46:26,120 --> 00:46:29,120
Speaker 3: It is simply a matter of revealing as much as

689
00:46:29,160 --> 00:46:32,600
Speaker 3: possible that people want to see and covering up anything

690
00:46:32,640 --> 00:46:34,360
Speaker 3: that's going to cause public disquiet.

691
00:46:36,440 --> 00:46:39,760
Speaker 2: Shortly before my deadline for the completion of a lengthy

692
00:46:39,880 --> 00:46:43,480
Speaker 2: Saturday article on the disclosure of the lists, I spoke

693
00:46:43,520 --> 00:46:47,120
Speaker 2: to Beryl Crosby. She had just returned from a Bunderberg

694
00:46:47,239 --> 00:46:51,560
Speaker 2: meeting with fellow members of the patient support group. Despite

695
00:46:51,600 --> 00:46:55,360
Speaker 2: the best efforts of various ministers and their advisors to

696
00:46:55,440 --> 00:47:00,560
Speaker 2: win Beryl Crosby over, she had refused to yield. Crosby

697
00:47:00,640 --> 00:47:01,120
Speaker 2: told me.

698
00:47:01,680 --> 00:47:04,320
Speaker 10: It's a disgusting, covered up mess from the time the

699
00:47:04,400 --> 00:47:06,480
Speaker 10: jan ptell as you broke, and everything we'd heard and

700
00:47:06,560 --> 00:47:08,920
Speaker 10: learned since, we thought nothing more could shock us. But

701
00:47:09,000 --> 00:47:11,560
Speaker 10: now these waiting lists have come out. If they had

702
00:47:11,600 --> 00:47:13,960
Speaker 10: been open and transparent in the beginning, the public would

703
00:47:13,960 --> 00:47:17,320
Speaker 10: have seen the problems and understood them better. It is depressing,

704
00:47:17,320 --> 00:47:19,959
Speaker 10: but this inquiry has also been a worthwhile exercise because

705
00:47:20,000 --> 00:47:22,640
Speaker 10: the system would have only got worse. It was like

706
00:47:22,680 --> 00:47:25,240
Speaker 10: a boil when it burst with Patel or the gunks

707
00:47:25,280 --> 00:47:28,360
Speaker 10: started coming out. Until it is all oosed out, it

708
00:47:28,400 --> 00:47:31,200
Speaker 10: will never begin to heal. But how do you heal it?

709
00:47:32,400 --> 00:47:37,440
Speaker 2: The doctors offered a variety of answers. Fundamentally, they wanted

710
00:47:37,480 --> 00:47:42,319
Speaker 2: the administration and political leaders to stop treating hospitals like

711
00:47:42,600 --> 00:47:46,440
Speaker 2: units of commerce. They pleaded for the system to be

712
00:47:46,480 --> 00:47:50,319
Speaker 2: properly funded to give patients good outcomes and slow the

713
00:47:50,360 --> 00:47:54,640
Speaker 2: flow of doctors and specialists to the private sector. When

714
00:47:54,760 --> 00:47:59,080
Speaker 2: doctor Jason Jenkins, a vascular surgeon at Royal Brisbane Hospital,

715
00:47:59,120 --> 00:48:02,080
Speaker 2: gave evidence here, the spared at the lack of top

716
00:48:02,160 --> 00:48:07,600
Speaker 2: level initiative and leadership. He pointed to an expensive abundance

717
00:48:07,760 --> 00:48:12,799
Speaker 2: of increasingly powerful bureaucrats with little insight into healthcare, but

718
00:48:12,960 --> 00:48:17,239
Speaker 2: finally tuned antennae for the political and executive line. On

719
00:48:17,400 --> 00:48:20,239
Speaker 2: damage control, Jenkins said.

720
00:48:21,040 --> 00:48:23,799
Speaker 20: It becomes an intolerable place to work when you're being

721
00:48:23,840 --> 00:48:27,759
Speaker 20: told to stop admitting because there are no beds. The

722
00:48:27,840 --> 00:48:30,040
Speaker 20: patients are piling up behind us and we can't keep

723
00:48:30,160 --> 00:48:33,480
Speaker 20: up with it. They're losing legs, they're losing their lives,

724
00:48:33,880 --> 00:48:37,920
Speaker 20: rupturing aneurysms because they haven't been seen in out patients

725
00:48:38,320 --> 00:48:41,200
Speaker 20: and that's a factor of funding. Every day we get

726
00:48:41,200 --> 00:48:45,880
Speaker 20: a message on our pages discharge patients, beds critical, no

727
00:48:45,960 --> 00:48:50,480
Speaker 20: admissions without approval. That's what you get every day at

728
00:48:50,480 --> 00:48:54,480
Speaker 20: the Royal Brisbane Hospital on my pager. It's become an

729
00:48:54,520 --> 00:48:58,919
Speaker 20: intolerable place to work because you can't actually work. You're

730
00:48:58,960 --> 00:49:02,280
Speaker 20: told to stop spending money because there's no money. Stop

731
00:49:02,280 --> 00:49:05,000
Speaker 20: putting in the best graft for the patient because we've

732
00:49:05,080 --> 00:49:08,439
Speaker 20: used up our prosthetics budget. Put in a business case

733
00:49:08,480 --> 00:49:11,319
Speaker 20: if you want to get something else done. We were

734
00:49:11,320 --> 00:49:13,840
Speaker 20: told the other day that all the business cases just

735
00:49:13,880 --> 00:49:16,279
Speaker 20: get thrown in a box at Charlotte Street because there's

736
00:49:16,280 --> 00:49:20,240
Speaker 20: no money to actually deal with them. We want to work,

737
00:49:20,640 --> 00:49:22,440
Speaker 20: but we're not allowed to work a lot of the

738
00:49:22,480 --> 00:49:26,320
Speaker 20: time because there's not the money to actually fund the system.

739
00:49:26,440 --> 00:49:29,360
Speaker 20: And at the moment, the general consensus in the public

740
00:49:29,400 --> 00:49:32,960
Speaker 20: hospital system is our leader doesn't go into battle for us.

741
00:49:33,680 --> 00:49:36,759
Speaker 20: When we ask for help, we get none. The only

742
00:49:36,800 --> 00:49:39,000
Speaker 20: help we get is when there is a crisis, because

743
00:49:39,400 --> 00:49:41,320
Speaker 20: we don't want to end up on the front page

744
00:49:41,320 --> 00:49:44,960
Speaker 20: of the courier mail. And I mean we're playing politics

745
00:49:45,239 --> 00:49:48,840
Speaker 20: with health. Health is people, and the problem at the

746
00:49:48,880 --> 00:49:52,879
Speaker 20: moment is where we're messing with it with politics. They

747
00:49:52,920 --> 00:49:56,160
Speaker 20: need to speak to clinicians and ask them what needs

748
00:49:56,200 --> 00:50:00,680
Speaker 20: to be done, not have administrators telling us what should

749
00:50:00,680 --> 00:50:03,680
Speaker 20: be doing. You know, I sometimes think we're playing for

750
00:50:03,719 --> 00:50:07,120
Speaker 20: a different team. We're playing for the health team and

751
00:50:07,160 --> 00:50:10,439
Speaker 20: they are playing for the budget team. So I guess

752
00:50:10,480 --> 00:50:13,759
Speaker 20: we're being made toothless tigers in a system which is

753
00:50:13,800 --> 00:50:17,640
Speaker 20: being run by administrators. I mean, one of the problems

754
00:50:17,719 --> 00:50:19,600
Speaker 20: is they don't come to us to ask us how

755
00:50:19,640 --> 00:50:23,040
Speaker 20: to fix the problems. Half the time they tell us

756
00:50:23,160 --> 00:50:25,680
Speaker 20: how to fix the problems. A lot of the time

757
00:50:26,000 --> 00:50:30,200
Speaker 20: that involves actually more administration and less patient care.

758
00:50:32,560 --> 00:50:36,160
Speaker 2: Earlier, Tony Morris had asked the Chief Health Officer, doctor

759
00:50:36,239 --> 00:50:37,920
Speaker 2: Jerry Fitzgerald.

760
00:50:38,160 --> 00:50:41,879
Speaker 3: Is there some difficulty with the proposition that the taxpayers

761
00:50:41,880 --> 00:50:44,239
Speaker 3: who pay for the health system in this state and

762
00:50:44,320 --> 00:50:47,560
Speaker 3: the members of the public who utilize public hospitals are

763
00:50:47,680 --> 00:50:50,680
Speaker 3: actually entitled to know that there is a problem in

764
00:50:50,719 --> 00:50:53,920
Speaker 3: the hospitals, rather than having it gathered dust in a

765
00:50:53,960 --> 00:50:57,799
Speaker 3: filing cabinet in Charlotte Street. When do we stop this

766
00:50:57,920 --> 00:51:01,839
Speaker 3: system of shooting the messenger and hiding the evidence rather

767
00:51:01,920 --> 00:51:04,480
Speaker 3: than putting it out in public so that things can

768
00:51:04,520 --> 00:51:05,960
Speaker 3: be done about these problems.

769
00:51:07,640 --> 00:51:12,440
Speaker 2: On twenty August, angry voters punished beating these two Labor

770
00:51:12,480 --> 00:51:17,399
Speaker 2: candidates were crushed by huge margins in by elections. The

771
00:51:17,400 --> 00:51:22,320
Speaker 2: health crisis had become a major political crisis. Malcolm Cole,

772
00:51:22,680 --> 00:51:26,360
Speaker 2: the couriermal State political correspondent, reported.

773
00:51:26,560 --> 00:51:29,920
Speaker 21: The Bead government faces its first serious electoral test at

774
00:51:29,920 --> 00:51:33,240
Speaker 21: the next state election after voters handed at two shattering

775
00:51:33,280 --> 00:51:36,719
Speaker 21: defeats in weekend by elections. The leaders of all three

776
00:51:36,760 --> 00:51:39,880
Speaker 21: major political parties said the massive swings against Labor in

777
00:51:39,920 --> 00:51:43,759
Speaker 21: its formerly safe seats of Chatsworth and Redcliffe proved the

778
00:51:43,840 --> 00:51:44,719
Speaker 21: next election.

779
00:51:44,600 --> 00:51:45,600
Speaker 9: Was an open contest.

780
00:51:48,400 --> 00:51:52,360
Speaker 2: Lawyer and political commentator Stephen Coach described the future for

781
00:51:52,560 --> 00:51:56,799
Speaker 2: Beating as potentially terminal because, as Stephen said.

782
00:51:57,440 --> 00:51:59,840
Speaker 3: Unless he can slay dragons and put on a sparkling

783
00:52:00,000 --> 00:52:03,680
Speaker 3: electrical performance, he faces a fool from power in disgrace.

784
00:52:11,200 --> 00:52:15,040
Speaker 2: Seek to Death is written and presented by me Hedley Thomas,

785
00:52:15,239 --> 00:52:20,359
Speaker 2: The Australians National Chief correspondent. Claire Harvey is The Australian's

786
00:52:20,520 --> 00:52:25,879
Speaker 2: editorial director. Audio editing, production and music have been done

787
00:52:25,960 --> 00:52:31,279
Speaker 2: by Jasper Leik, with assistants from Leah Sammaglu and Neil Sutherland.

788
00:52:31,760 --> 00:52:36,719
Speaker 2: Our producer is Christin Amias. Production management by Stephanie Coombs.

789
00:52:37,400 --> 00:52:42,880
Speaker 2: Artwork by Sean Callanan. Thanks to Ryan Osland, Matthew Condon,

790
00:52:43,160 --> 00:52:49,920
Speaker 2: Karina Berger, Ellie Dudley, David Murray, Dominique McDermott, Zach Sculander

791
00:52:50,160 --> 00:52:53,960
Speaker 2: and all our family, friends and colleagues who helped in

792
00:52:54,000 --> 00:52:58,800
Speaker 2: this series and contributed voice acting and special thanks to

793
00:52:58,800 --> 00:53:04,399
Speaker 2: Tony Hoffman and Rob Messenger. Subscribers to The Australian hear

794
00:53:04,640 --> 00:53:08,640
Speaker 2: new episodes of Sick to Death first at Sick to

795
00:53:08,760 --> 00:53:12,880
Speaker 2: Deathpodcast Dot com and on Apple Podcasts.

796
00:53:13,520 --> 00:53:15,640
Speaker 1: You can get exclusive.

797
00:53:15,000 --> 00:53:37,760
Speaker 2: Access to photographs, videos, timelines, and more at the website