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Speaker 1: In a throwback to dhb's Health New Zealand has appointed

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Speaker 1: four new regional directors aimed at bringing decision making back

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Speaker 1: to the local level. It comes just a week after

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Speaker 1: the board was sacked and replaced with the commissioner. The

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Speaker 1: Association of Salaried Medical Specialists executive director Sarah Dalton's with

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Speaker 1: me now, Sarah, good morning, Good to have you on

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Speaker 1: the program. First of all, does this seem counterintuitive to you?

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Speaker 1: At one level we've got, oh, it's too much to bureaucracy,

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Speaker 1: and now we're appointing four more managers.

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Speaker 2: I don't know, Ryan, We've already got regional directors in place,

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Speaker 2: they've been there for a while. These new regional directors

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Speaker 2: who will replace them have got a different set of

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Speaker 2: responsibilities and delegations, including I think bringing oversight of commissioning

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Speaker 2: or parts of the funded health sector back under their oversight.

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Speaker 2: It's I don't know. For our members, you know, who

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Speaker 2: are working in hospitals at the front line, the biggest

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Speaker 2: challenge I think is workforce and staffing levels, and you

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Speaker 2: know their lack of colleagues and so there's been a

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Speaker 2: lot of rhetoric from the government and from the new

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Speaker 2: Commissioner lest A Levy that there is enough money, there

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Speaker 2: won't be any more money, and that they can make

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Speaker 2: do with what they've got, And that does not feel

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Speaker 2: great from where we're sitting in terms of whether there

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Speaker 2: are enough doctors out there to get the work done

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Speaker 2: safely in an untimely manner.

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Speaker 1: You're you're representing senior salary doctors and dentists and things

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Speaker 1: like that. Have you noticed have your members noticed are

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Speaker 1: changed in frontline staff, because that was the theory we

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Speaker 1: would get rid of some back office and we would

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Speaker 1: feel it more in the front we would have more

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Speaker 1: people at the front. Do we.

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Speaker 2: No. I've just been traveling around the country talking directly

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Speaker 2: with members because we're going back into collective bargaining in

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Speaker 2: a month or so to talk about their core terms

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Speaker 2: and conditions, and they are they're desperate for more colleagues. So,

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Speaker 2: you know, if less Levy and the new regional directors

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Speaker 2: can show us data about where all these doctors are

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Speaker 2: supposed to be, we would love to see it because

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Speaker 2: what we see as people who are very stressed, who

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Speaker 2: are working really hard, and who are really concerned about

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Speaker 2: their inability to give the level of care to people

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Speaker 2: who need it in a timely fashion. So things are

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Speaker 2: very difficult out there, and so we don't have oversight

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Speaker 2: as to the where the money exactly is going in

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Speaker 2: terms of these budget provisions. But from the information I

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Speaker 2: have seen, you know, a lot of it is about

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Speaker 2: paying people that what they're worth. You know, there's been

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Speaker 2: a little it's it almost feels like nurses are being

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Speaker 2: blamed for you know, we've we've recruited too many nurses

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Speaker 2: too quickly. But that is a really weird thing to say,

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Speaker 2: because there are still significant gaps out there. The fact

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Speaker 2: that Healthy Zealand has been successful recruiting nurses is a

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Speaker 2: good thing and we need to put other measures in

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Speaker 2: place about the success of their health system, not just budget.

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Speaker 1: Sarah Dalton, thank you very much for your time this morning.

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Speaker 1: Appreciate it. The Association of Salaried Medical Specialists Executive Director,

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Speaker 1: Sarah Dalton. For more from News Talks b listen live

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Speaker 1: on air or online, and keep our shows with you

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