FREE TREATMENT

Waikato Times, Volume 128, Issue 21367, 11 March 1941, Page 6

FREE TREATMENT

OUT-PATIENT SERVICE DISPUTE WITH MINISTER AUCKLAND CHAIRMAN'S VIEWS (By Telegraph.—Press Association) GREYMOUTIi, Tuesday Commenting this morning an the report from Auckland of the remarks made by Mr Allan Moody, chairman of the Auckland Hospital Board, and the decision of the board •not to provide the free out-patient service, tlv Minister of Health, the Hon. A. H. Nordmeyer, said: “While Mr Moody was sulking in Auckland, the remaining members of the Hospital Boards’ Association executive, were meeting me in a conference at Wellington. As a result of our discussions, satisfactory arrangements to the Government on one side and to the hospital boards cn the other, were entered into. The attitude of the gentlemen on the executive was in striking contrast to that exhibited on this occasion, and on others, by the chairman of the Auckland Hospital Board. “Regulations are ready and will be gazetted shortly,” he concluded. “The only change that will now require to be made will be the insertion of a provision requiring the Auckland Hospital Board to refund to any person whom it has charged for outpatient service since March 1 the amount so charged.” Chairman’s Remarks Mr Allan J. Moody is reported to have said at a meeting of the board that hospital boards were not going to be used as a means of bringing the scheme into effect. “I am afraid the Minister is becoming somewhat timid about the scheme,” Mr Moody continued. “We as a board will not allow ourselves to be used to legislate, for the Dominion.” As business men, they should carry on with outpatient treatment on the same lines until the Government declared its proposals. His idea was that consideration of hospital benefits should be deferred until the position was made clear. The chairman added the Hospital Boards’ Association had a meeting three weeks ago to discuss the matter, but the Minister did not wait for the conference, but went off to some function in the south. Mr Moody said he had later received a call to go to Wellington, but he had not complied with it. “I am not at the beck and call of any Minister of the Crown,” he added. “If the Minister wants to see me, he can come to Auckland.’’ The chairman said he had written to the association expressing the hope that it would not be used as an instrument to bring the scheme into effect. He only hoped the executive had the intelligence not to be lured into a trap. MR MOODY’S REPLY NO OFFICIAL ADVICE (By Telegraph.—Press Association) AUCKLAND, Tuesday Replying to Mr Nordmeyer today Mr Moody said: “Unlike certain Cabinet Ministers I wish to state that I have neither the time nor inclination to sulk when I do not get my way or when I am not capable of making up my mind cn a definite course of action. “I have not yet received official advice, whether the remaining members of the Hospital Boards’ Association executive have, as stated, made satisfactory arrangements with the Government and. personally, I would prefer to wait until I have this statement from the association itself, because 1 do not intend to accept the Minister’s bald and, to my mind, unconvincing statement. It may be that this statement is as accurate as his remarks concerning the general body of medical practitioners accepting the Government’s medical benefits plan. “The threat to require the Auckland Hospital Board to refund any out-patients’ service fees is, of course, a matter of the responsibility of the Government or the Minister, who will act quite wrongly. I think, in making the board do something which is contrary to commonsense methods. “ Bring in Regulation ” “Instead of the Minister wasting time dealing with this type of regulation why does he not get on with the job? If he has that conviction, which he alleges he has, let him bring the necessary regulation into effect to compel the hospital boards to give their out-patients treatment free. If this is done then the board can act in full compliance with the law and not risk having its actions questioned by the auditor. “Once again I do object to the Minister, or Department, attempting to use the Hospital Boards’ Association as a means of ‘implementing’ the full polity of the Government.”