Barry Soper: Ethnicity no longer factor in waiting list a fair outcome for all

It’s not often in this business that you can sit back with some satisfaction and feel justified a year later that a story you broke resulted in an outcome fair to all.

The formal part ethnicity played in hospital waiting lists caused a political storm.

It was justified by the then Labour Government whose Health Minister Ayesha Verrall said she was happy with the policy that gave Māori and Pasifika patients priority over Pākehā and other ethnicities.

A.E. Thompson: Saving Money and Sense at Health New Zealand

Health NZ's governing board was replaced with a commissioner to rein in budget overruns. One might wonder where savings can be made. Unfortunately, some of the savings will be at the expense of 'front line' health services if critics are correct in alleging that the percentage increased funding for health fell well short the percentage increase in population due to immigration and the increased proportion of aging baby boomers placing greater demands on health services.

However, publications from Health NZ point to considerable race-based ideological investment of dubious benefit. For example, a communication last week stated:

Mike Hosking: We got nowhere this week with the health equity scandal

I don’t think I am alone in thinking we have got about nowhere in this scandal around race based health prioritisation.

Sadly it has, entirely predictably, descended into a race scrap where by those who quite rightly ask questions about a highly contentious issue are simply called racist.

Being called racist is the laziest of responses sadly rolled out on queue to often these days by people who have run out of sensible arguments.