30 November 2001

Health Minister Says Patient Welfare Must Come First

Health Minister Annette King says she is deeply concerned that the welfare of patients should be the primary consideration during planned industrial action in Canterbury.

“Matters relating to employment agreements must be worked out between District Health Boards and their staff within the resources each board has available,” Mrs King said today.

“The people of New Zealand voted for a system of DHBs so they could have a local say in the way health boards spent their money.

“It is not appropriate for me to interfere in local decision-making, but I am urging both the DHB and staff to look at longer-term solutions to problems that nurses acknowledge have emerged over the last 10 years.

“Patient safety must be of paramount concern. I recognise that unions have shown some flexibility regarding exemptions to the strike and I thank them for that.

“However, I am also conscious of ongoing concerns that the Canterbury DHB management and the Ministry of Health still have on this issue and I call upon the unions involved to remain in close discussions with the DHB to ensure all patient safety issues are addressed.”

Ends

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>