NSW: Waiting list reporting procedures flawed - ICAC

AAP General News (Australia)
02-13-2004
NSW: Waiting list reporting procedures flawed - ICAC

SYDNEY, Feb 13 AAP - Procedures for reporting hospital waiting lists in NSW were flawed,
the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) found today.

The ICAC released a report into alleged misreporting of waiting list data at five public
hospitals - Prince of Wales, St George, St Vincent's, Sydney/Sydney Eye and Bankstown.

The investigation found no-one had deliberately or dishonestly misreported the waiting
list data under guidelines the Carr government introduced after winning office.

But the ICAC found data reporting procedures were flawed.

"Those guidelines were so loose and ambiguous that they not only created extensive
opportunity for data to be artificially manipulated for personal and political purposes,
but they also contributed to the making of allegations that improper practices occurred
when they had not," the report said.

Health Minister Morris Iemma said neither the government nor individual hospitals was to blame.

"The ICAC report quite clearly states there is no stuff-up on the part of anyone,"

Mr Iemma told reporters outside St George Hospital.

"There's no corrupt conduct, there is no corrupt conduct on the part of any individual
and in any hospital and anyone in the Department of Health."

The ICAC launched its investigation after a referral from the health department in
April last year, which included a department review of waiting list data at 14 public
hospitals.

The department's review found evidence of misreporting of data at five hospitals.

AAP mj/af/sal/cmc/jlw

KEYWORD: LISTS

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