The Ashburton Guardian. Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 1888. ROBBING THE PUBLIC.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1907, 1 August 1888, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian. Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 1888. ROBBING THE PUBLIC.

In his annual report to Parliament on the Hospitals and Charitable Institutions of the colony Dr Macgregor, the Inspec tor, gives two instances of how the question of the outdoor department of our Hospitals is involved with and merges m the general problem of charitable aid. The instances quoted are those of the Thames Hospital and the Hokitika Hospital. In the case of the former particularly the Inspector has done service to the general taxpayer m showing up a disgraceful line of proceeding on the part of the local authorities at the Thames.

Dr Macgregor says :— ." The Thames Hospital is a separate institution under the Act. Dr Williams, the surgeon, receives a salary of £450 a year and a house, without the right of private practice ; the head nurse gets £50 ; four nurses get £40 each ; a cook, laundress, and an old patient who acts as gardener complete the staff, which cost last year £868 6s 4d m salaries alone. The total expenditure for the year was £2,210 15s 7d, from which must te deducted £317 17s Id for real estate and buildings, leaving £1,024 12s 2d for supplies, &c, and of this the drug-bill amounted to £160 18s Bd. A t the time of my visit there were ten patients m the hospital, but it must be added that at times this number is increased considerably. The mere juxtaposition of these figures for salaries and supplies reveals a most extraordinary state of things, the explanation of which is to be found m the fact that the Trustees have thrown open the outdoor department of the hospital to all persons whatsoever, whether rich or poor, who are willing* to pay 5s per week for advice and medicine. The result is that tho general body of the taxpayers of the colony have, through the Government subsidy, to contribute towards giving cheap medical advice to the Thames people, by enabling the people to undersell the local medical men by the competition of a salaried officer, and by the same means towards injuring the druggists and undermining the selfrespect of the people. During 1887 there were treated on these terms 1,839 individual patients with 3,357 attendances. lam informed that, m order to leave Dr Williams free to overtake this rapidly increasing demand for his services on these terms, the Trustees desire to relieve him of all charitable aid work, which they want the local doctors, whom they are starving out, to undertake 1"

It is time such a course of action was stopped, and the authorities made to know what is fair and equitable m Hospital treatment. Since attention has been drawn to the matter there has been some amendment, for Dr Macgregor says of the Thames Hospital further on : — " In another part of this report I called attention to what I may call the rcry astute theory of management adopted by the Hospital Trustees m this town (Thames), and felt called upon to make some remarks thereupon. Here, however, I am bound to say that since my last visit the institution is not like the same place. It has been completely transformed both m its surroundings and its internal arrangements, which are alike admirable. The introduction of lady nurses has greatly helped to produce the present improved state of affairs ; and, if only one could justify the means, the results reflect the greatest credit on all concerned."

With reference to the system m vogue at the Hokitika Hospital, the Inspector says, following his comments on tho Thames institution : — " A somewhat analogous, though less mischievous, practice has grown np m tho Weßtland Hospital District. Tho Trustees, by their by-law 18, say : * District Committees shall have the power to make a rule by which persons paying an annual amount to itß funds Bhall be entitled to admission into the Hospital or to out-* door treatment free of charge during the year covered by such subscriptions ; but no annual ticket shall be granted by any Committee for a less sum than ten .shillings for each year.' Jt is evident that these tickets are of the nature of insurance or benefit contracts, and cannot, therefore, by any ingenuity of argument be shown to be voluntary subscriptions, such as are contemplated by the Act. Yet I find that the Government has been paying without question £1 4s m the pound subsidy on these payments. I find also that it is the custom for patients, no matter how long they may have been inmates of the hospital or receiving outdoor treatment, or however well off they may be, to consider that their 10s ticket clears thena |of all liability. It will »ot surprise my

one to find that m theso circumstances the number of out-patier.ts is unusually great, the drug-bill unusually high, the local rate exceedingly heavy, especially on town property, and that every device is exhausted to get the Government to pay the persistent deficit."

To show how such a pernicious system falls heavily upon the local ratepayers as well as on the general body of taxpayers, Dr. Macgregor quotes a statement made to the Hon Mr Mitchelson by a deputation from the Hokitika Borough Council on February 20th last, complaining of the excessive outla> J required to comply with the provisions of the Hospitals and Charitable Insti- ! tortious Act. The deputation said : — "By the appended figures you will perceive how exceedingly heavy this tax has been upon the Borough of Hokitika, which for the year 1886-87 had to levy a rate of 6d m the pound, and for 1887-88 a rate of 9d m the pound, m order to raise £600 towards the sum m which this borough was mulcted for the current financial year. As you are aware, the provisions of " The Hospitals and Charitable Institutions Aot Amendment Act, 1886," permit a grant of £1 4s for every pound of voluntary subscriptions, and, as the citizens of Hokitika have, through their representatives, voluntarily taxed themselves, we venture to urge that the Cabinet will not be exceeding its functions m subsidising the sum of £1000 levied on the borough during the past two years by the 4s over and above the subsidy of £1 paid or payable to the Hospital Board of Westland. Other boroughs, you will notice, only paid from 6 to 20 per cent of their ordinary rates, while Hokitika is called upon to pay 80 per cent."

These two cases have been singled out simply to illustrate a tendency, which Dr. IVfacgreror says pervades the whole Hospital system of the colony m a more or less marked degree, and further the Inspector goes on to say : — " All our hospitals, with a few honorable exceptions, as conducted prior to the introduction of the Hospitals and Charitable Institutions Act, were powerful, though indirect agencies, m pauperising the people. In almost every part of New Zealand persons who were able to pay for medical advice and medicine had no hesitation m accepting aid m forma pauperis, and, while the old system continued, there was no difficulty m getting the Government to make good the deficiency. The extent to which this was allowed to go m New Zealand can only be understood when taken as a phase ot the social fever that attended the rise, the culmination, and the wane of our public-works policy." A long list of figures are given to bear out these assertions and on the first blush it would seem that the Inspeotor is right. Certainly there must be some degree of truth m wbat he says, but as to the remedy the question must be at all times a debateable one. What we wished to show was the unfair way m which the Hospital Boards W8 have referred to were undermining every principle of self respect and heaping upon the general public a burden which with its own weight would soon have broken the whole system entirely. There is much m Dr Macgregor's remarks on the whole system of Charitable Aid which muat convey conviction to the mind of the general reader that our system of dispensing Charitable Aid is open to grave abuse,