COMMENT: It has been nearly a year since a public committee meeting was held at Southern District Health Board. Health reporter Eileen Goodwin went along and found little by way of debate or questioning.
Media representatives outnumbered the public yesterday when the Southern District Health Board commissioner held the first committee meeting in public nearly a year after her appointment.
Just four people showed up apart from board staff, the commissioner team, and a handful of media representatives.
The meeting fodder was the same as before board members were sacked last year: Stodgy reports typified by sentences like "the anticipated outcome will be an agreed programme of implementation with key stakeholders''.
With no elected members, nothing even vaguely controversial risked coming up at the low-key meeting.
It was enough to test the mettle of even the most determined witness of the first democratic process under way in almost a year at the board.
No-one asked about additional food service costs of $1.8million so far this financial year, which was partly offset by lower staffing costs, disclosed in a financial report.
Overall, the board's finances are tracking favourably against its budgeted deficit.
The Waitaki health service review, support for Syrian refugees, and the establishment of better links with GPs were among items briefly discussed.
It took just under an hour, and was technically two meetings: the hospital advisory committee, and the combined disability/public health committee. There was no break. The same people were on both committees.
Running one after another was a help to members of the public and the media, who would otherwise have been turfed out at the end of the first meeting to allow closed-door deliberation in the public-excluded session. Instead, two closed-door sessions were held as one.
Last month, when the resumption of the meetings was announced, commissioner Kathy Grant said there would be no public-excluded section, but that is not the case.
While it might seem paradoxical, the listed public-excluded section increases transparency as it allows the public to see what is discussed behind closed doors.
Nine items were listed in the closed section, including a confidential planning and funding report, discussion of serious adverse patient events, recommended building assessments for the Dunedin Hospital redevelopment, and a radiology update.
The only community member set to be on the committees, an iwi representative, is yet to be appointed.
