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Speaker 1: We ended last week with some hopeful noises from the

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Speaker 1: health sector. I even said, oh, some good news is

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Speaker 1: finally Minister Simmy and Brown was praised by academics and

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Speaker 1: commentators for us increased funding for nurse practitioners, advanced training

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Speaker 1: for nurses and increased training for doctors who come from overseas.

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Speaker 1: He also announced an increase in the number of doctors

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Speaker 1: we train here and that On Friday he announced the

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Speaker 1: health Plan which sees Lester Levy replaced by a board

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Speaker 1: and five targets were announced, all focusing on speedier health

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Speaker 1: care and outcomes and to truth through the waiting list.

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Speaker 1: The minister started talking about utilizing private facilities. I think

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Speaker 1: at this point it's important to think about where we

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Speaker 1: came from and where we are. Labour tried to reduce

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Speaker 1: the DHBs from over twenty to forty and introduced a

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Speaker 1: Milordi Health Authority, even though the right wing had been

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Speaker 1: complaining about the inefficiency of too many boards for years.

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Speaker 1: When a left wing government does it, it's branded as

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Speaker 1: a socialist's central government takeover. So we decided to reverse

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Speaker 1: it and after fifty million dollars was spent pursuing the

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Speaker 1: four megaboards. We appear to be right back where we started,

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Speaker 1: except we are not right back where we started. Lester

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Speaker 1: Levy has been cutting the workforce, and the workforce complains

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Speaker 1: that the whole sector has been hollowed out. We have

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Speaker 1: more funding than ever. We're told that all the time,

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Speaker 1: particularly by the Prime Minister, and yet it did not

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Speaker 1: keep pace with inflation. And I'm talking about the last

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Speaker 1: twenty years, not just the last one. And to cope

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Speaker 1: with the waiting lists that are built up over the decades,

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Speaker 1: patients are now being directed to the private system. The

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Speaker 1: upshot is that the public system is slowly withering, very

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Speaker 1: slowly though, and it's a good time to be a

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Speaker 1: shareholder and a private health facility because you're getting the overflow.

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Speaker 1: We seem to be heading towards a two tier health system,

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Speaker 1: one for those with money and one for those without.

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Speaker 1: And increasingly, if you don't have health insurance, you're playing

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Speaker 1: a waiting game about who will see you first. So

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Speaker 1: Peter or the surgeon for more from Early edition with

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Speaker 1: Ryan Bridge. Listen live to News Talks it be from

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Speaker 1: five am weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.