THEY came to town with a proposal to shut the local hospital.
But when the dust settled on a heated town meeting in Moura last night, members of the CQ Hospital and Health Service (HHS) Board were vowing to fight alongside community members to see local health services enhanced.
“We have had a very good meeting – very constructive,” CQHHS Board chairman Charles Ware said.
“While the outcome is still a little fuzzy we know where we want to go as a board and as the Moura community and that is to a new model of care that will be sustainable and can be duplicated throughout rural Queensland.
“We are going to work very hard and, as the meeting has requested the Ministers involvement, we will be approaching the Minister next week, if not tomorrow, to take this forward.”
Earlier in the night, Mr Ware had outlined a proposal to close the Moura Hospital and transfer most of the emergency services to the Moura Medical Centre.
The proposal was designed to help the CQHHS Board cope with the withdrawal of $4.8 million in Federal Government funding this financial year.
The board argued that it had been costing more than $8000 a day to keep the hospital open and that occupancy rates had been declining in recent years.
But the 600-strong crowd voiced strong opposition to the proposal, with many disputing the Board’s figures.
During a half time break, locals Debbie Elliot and Chris Jones, approached the board with a new proposal to put all plans on hold while a new consultation period began.
“We could see the meeting was getting bogged down looking at a proposal that would have never worked in Moura so we approached them about a new way forward,” Ms Elliot said.
“We want to go to the Minister together and see if we can look at creating a really innovative model of health care in Moura that can be used as an example for the whole State.
“We don’t know what the model is going to look like but I do know that the idea of doing things at the Medical Centre is not going to work here.
“We would like the doctor’s surgery to just remain as a doctor’s surgery and maybe we can look at doing some things differently at the hospital.”
Mr Ware gave a public assurance that the Moura Hospital would remain open and no jobs would be lost while the consultation period continued.
But Mr Ware stopped short of making an assurance that no hospitals would close in the CQHHS on his watch.
“I can assure everyone here tonight that the Moura Hospital will not close while this consultation period is on and that we are committed to working with the local community to find a solution,” he said.
Mr Ware said he was surprised and humbled by the outcome of the meeting.
“I have been following the community protest and I have been getting a lot of emails, phone calls and personal mail myself so I was well aware of the community outrage,” he said.
“That’s why we came here – we are a very open board and we have nothing to hide.
“We put it all on the table and got the feedback we wanted. Unfortunately it took us a while to do that and I apologised for that at the meeting.”
Several locals also voiced outrage that the local member, Jeff Seeney and Health Minister Laurence Springborg had not attended the meeting.
But Mr Ware said he had not expected any State members to attend.
“We want to row our own boat,” he said.
There was also concern among locals that Moura health services were under review when the local mining industry generated significant wealth for the State Government.
Former councillor and Theodore resident, Ron Bock, attended the meeting to offer his support to the Moura community.
“When the LNP Government was elected this time, part of the deal was that they were going to return some of the royalties to back to places like Moura,” he said.
“Millions of dollars in royalties and taxes have come out of this community and yet they are not prepared to spend a measly one million dollars to bring the hospital up to scratch.”
* Executives from the CQHHS will meet with community members in Moura on Tuesday to begin planning a new model of health care for the Moura community.
