He started his career teaching health to Year 11s. The doctor who delivered him is still his GP.
The move to a nationalised health system was long overdue. The establishment of Te Whatu Ora and Te Aka Whai Ora a year ago would not solve all the country’s health issues overnight but he is starting to see real benefits of the change.
Utikere said the removal of the $5 prescription charge was making a huge difference.
The Labour Government had invested in health and Health Minister Dr Ayesha Verrall and her predecessor Andrew Little had both visited Palmerston North.
There was still much work to be done but Labour had a determined and dedicated focus to hone in on the issues that matter most, Utikere said.
Foxton GP Dr David Le Page, who has been a GP for more than 40 years, said the establishment of Te Whatu Ora had just moved a bunch of bureaucrats sideways. If anything had changed since July 1, 2022, health provision had gone backwards and the restructuring was an “absolute failure”.
Utikere said the removal of district health boards meant meeting health needs was no longer constrained by the physical boundaries of DHBs and the resources within them.
None of the GPs present said they had seen examples of this when asked by a colleague.
About 25 medical professionals, mostly GPs but also nurses, nurse practitioners, a physiotherapist and a clinical psychologist, attended the meeting.
Dr Laura McAulay, a Palmerston North GP, said Te Whatu Ora hadn’t changed anything. She said while political parties were proposing to change immigration settings to attract more medical professionals to New Zealand, if the country does not have appropriate remuneration no one is going to move here.
National candidate for Palmerston North Ankit Bansal said a National government would turn around worsening health outcomes by bringing back targets that would be publicised monthly.
Te Whatu Ora might not survive in its current form.
National would create a minister of mental health so mental health was no longer the poor cousin of health.
In a double act for Act, Rangitīkei candidate Shane Hoggard and Palmerston North candidate Mike Harnett spoke.
Hoggard, a dairy farmer, said his background was in bovine health. However, he had noticed it was taking longer to get an appointment to see his GP.
Harnett said Act would subsidise private hospitals to do surgeries for the public sector. As a physiotherapist, he was sick of babysitting people who needed hip and knee replacements when he knew surgery was what they need.
Ali Muhammad, Green Party candidate for Ōtaki, talked about the party’s income guarantee policy.
Rangitīkei Green Party candidate Bernard Long said there was significant poverty in New Zealand, which wasn’t the case once. Poverty is a political decision or lack thereof.
That 20 per cent of Kiwi children are living in poverty must be addressed as part of the solution to not only health issues but every other issue the country faces, he said.
Dr Ken Young, chairman of Whanganui Regional Health Network, said to be fair to the Government, making changes to the health system is like turning an oil tanker around - it takes time.
He called for health to be taken out of the political forum and for politicians to stop kicking each other’s heads in. Cross-party action was needed.
The briefing notes for the speakers said the shortage of GPs in Manawatū is a pressing concern and GPs are facing increasing workloads.
