More than 100 people heard a warning about government plans to privatise hospitals – and power poles and wires – at a meeting of Maitland Community Union Alliance in East Maitland on Monday night.
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The Alliance is a non-political group of Maitland people concerned about government privatisation plans.
NSW Nurses and Midwives Association secretary Brett Holmes warned that the state government planned to make the new hospital at Metford privately operated, despite promising the community that it would be a public hospital.
Mr Holmes also warned about the destruction of Australia’s Medicare system and the impact this would have on the community, working as a US system of private health care.
He said the government had ripped billions of dollars from the public hospital system, which consequently increased workloads for health care workers.
Mr Holmes said people would be forced to attend hospitals instead of seeing their local doctors as a result of the federal government’s $7 Medicare service charge.
“I have seen the US system up close,” he said.
“Let me tell you, it does not work for the sick, the nurses and doctors or society as a whole.”
Adam Kerslake from the Electrical Trades Union said government plans to sell the electricity poles and wires was a natural monopoly.
“Once foreign companies get their hands on this cash cow – which currently returns $1.7 billion to state government coffers – they will be raking it in, while our maintenance costs go through the roof,” he warned.
“We will be hostages to faceless corporations when our power lines are down due to fire, floods or just as a result of wear and tear.”