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DR JIKO LUVENI MINISTER FOR HEALTH, WOMEN & SOCIAL WELFARE MOH CONFERENCE ROOM 2, 8TH MAY 2008 The Permanent Secretary Directors and Senior Managers of the Ministry Ladies and Gentlemen: A very good morning to you all I am pleased to be invited here this morning and to officially open this meeting for senior management staff of the Ministry of Health, Women and Social Welfare. This is the first ever meeting of the Senior Management Committee (SMC) with a structure and objectives similar to that of the old Senior Management and Operation Committee (SMOC) of the Ministry of Health, before the decentralization in 2004. Indeed, this new committee – SMC, now includes the management staff of the department of women, social welfare and poverty monitoring in its membership. Needless to mention, the SMC will be an important forum for information sharing and for opinion gathering on and for major policy matters of the Ministry. So I am glad to see the presence of all senior management staff in the meeting today. Colleagues, as you are all aware of, the Ministry of Health since January of this year, became a joint Ministry with Women and Social Welfare. This is the first time in our history that we have this merged portfolio particularly with women and poverty monitoring. It is four months down the line now and I personally feel that there are potential benefits from this merger as it has been indeed a pleasing challenge to address and implement issues and programmes that are not traditionally health based. Colleagues, I am pleased to share with you that in the first quarter of this year, we were able to compile and submit to Cabinet, the Annual Reports of both the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Women and Social Welfare. Furthermore, it is good to note that the outstanding AR from 2004 for the separate Ministry of Women & Social Welfare is now addressed. This is good achievement for our joint Ministry. On our work for the year colleagues, the annual work of the Ministry of Health, Women and Social Welfare is laid out in the Corporate Plan 2008. Furthermore and particularly for the Department of Health, the Corporate Plan incorporates and operationalises the objectives and strategies as contained in the National Health Strategic Plan 2005-2008. Our Corporate Plan was one of the first to be compiled and completed by Government Ministries. A new addition to the CP this year is the incorporation of the Deliverables of the Minister in the strategy objectives listing. Needless to mention colleagues, when I was appointed as Minister for Health, Women and Social Welfare in January of this year, it was required of me to formulate and present to the Prime Minister some key deliverables to be achieved by the end of the year. My key deliverables basically lists 3 key focus areas of; Focus 1. Elimination of Corruption Focus 2. Abuses and Mismanagement Focus 3. Delivery of Public Service Overall, key areas of work of the Ministry are listed as Targets and are included under Focus 3 under Delivery of Public Service. In summary, there 11 Targets and 33 Activities in the Deliverables for all Departments of the Ministry. Colleagues, I wish to move on and briefly address some key activities of the Ministry. At the beginning of the year, a decision on the re-assignment of the key management positions at the divisional level was made and implemented. The re-assignment led to the creation of management positions in urgent and key areas of health services such as Pharmacy, Biomedical Supplies, Planning, Information and Infrastructure. Indeed the decision of Government on the 10% reduction of the workforce and operational budget became linked and complimentary to the re-organisation of our management structure. The process of reforming our management structure is yet to be completed as the divisional structure along with that of the Fiji School of Nursing are still to be finalized by the Public Service Commission. I urge you managers to work with the Permanent Secretary and PSC in meeting our targets. On staffing issue, for the Department of Women and Social Welfare, recent movements of administrative staff need to be followed up with PSC particularly in relation to staff replacement. Technical staff number for both departments remained stable. For the Department of Health, staffing remained comparatively favourable at the present time. On an average, we have around 50 vacancies for medical officers during the year. Currently, there are only 28 vacancies on record and the Ministry, following a recent Cabinet Decision, will be conducting a recruitment drive in India for certain senior vacant positions. With regards to nurses, we have a current vacancy of 13 nurses and following the recent graduation of nurses from the Sangam School of Nursing last week, the health system will have it full compliment of its approved staff number by as early as next week. As for Dentists and Paramedical cadres, supply to the workforce is more than adequate against our approved staff establishment. Indeed, there is a need for the Central Agencies of Government to consider increasing our establishment number for these areas of work as there is definite need for service expansion and provision. Colleagues, on issues relating to staff training, may I congratulate the nursing fraternity and management of Lautoka Hospital for re-launching, after 20 years, the midwifery training school at Lautoka. This development will definitely address midwifery training needs for nurses in the Western Division. For clinical services, I am pleased to note the ongoing work of the clinical services network in addressing and ensuring a more coordinated approach to clinical services improvement. The recent introduction of kidney dialysis by a key partner is welcomed and appreciated. Moreover, Government as a matter of policy is considering introducing cardiac catheterization services in the Ministry. Whilst this service will benefit a section of our community and cardiac patients, we must be ensure that the ongoing cost of the service will not unduly drain our meager resources particularly resources allocated to primary prevention and care. Furthermore and in the realm of surgical services, I wish to urge and stress on management on the need to address the backlog of surgery currently faced by the major hospitals. On this matter, I have instructed the Permanent Secretary that a target of at least 50% reduction in the current waiting list be achieved by the end to the year. I urge you all to urgently address this issue. For public health, the ongoing disease outbreak of typhoid is a major problem. I am encouraged by the recent symposium in Savusavu on our strategies for typhoid control. As I had relayed to the Permanent Secretary, Cabinet is greatly concerned with the ongoing outbreak and is willing to provide additional resources to address control measures. As such, I will be awaiting the report and recommendation of the typhoid symposium before deciding on any further action. With regards to another public health disease of HIV, the ongoing report of willful transmission of HIV is a major concern to all of us. Whilst the current provision under the law might be limiting, we must intensify our awareness campaign on disease prevention and also use the NGO networks for counseling services for those living with HIV/AIDS. The revision of existing laws in public health and the formulation of parallel new ones must be our target as outlined in the Corporate Plan 2008. For our Department of Women, I am pleased to note the staff’s renewed energy towards addressing women issues in Fiji. Indeed in the past 4 months, I was able to present in Cabinet, for discussion and decision, 3 papers on keys issues of the Department. Two of the Cabinet Papers namely Women in Peace Building and Women in Decision Making have seen Cabinet endorsing the milestone decisions namely; 1. That women representation in Government Statutory Boards to be at least 30% 2. That the Minister for Women becomes a member of the Security Council and department of women officials members of national security committees. These decisions of Cabinet have wider implication in the advancement of women’s agenda especially on the empowerment of women. The implementation of the Women’s Plan of Action 1999-2008 is one of the core functions of our Ministry. Recently, Cabinet agreed to the review of the WPA and the need to formulate a new WPA covering the years 2009 and beyond. I am also very please to note that this week, the Department of Women has reactivate the dormant institutional mechanism built into the WPA namely the Inter-Ministerial Committee and the Taskforces. It is our belief that the re- establishment of the taskforces, our participation in committees of other Ministries and our input to the National Council of Building a Better Fiji can all be complimentary and contributory to women’s empowerment and gender equality in Fiji. For the Social Welfare Department, I am pleased to note that like to the Department of Women, 3 Cabinet Papers and Decision have been presented and processed so far. One Cabinet Paper and Decision relates to Minimum Standard of Care and is greatly welcomed. The Department of Social Welfare is responsible under the Juveniles Act (Cap 56) for the residential placement and care of children and young people who are abandoned or deemed to be in need of care and protection. Children who have committed an offence or are awaiting trial are also placed under care order with the Director of Social Welfare. For information of health staff, there are seven major residential facilities catering for babies awaiting adoption, children under care orders, young offenders and those on remand awaiting a court appearance maintained by the Department I applaud the department for updating the Minimum Standards of Care for children in residential placement. The Minimum Standard of Care will become the guiding principle for care givers for children placed in State care under the Director of Social Welfare. For the Poverty Monitoring Unit, I note the proposed activity in the Corporate Plan for the review of cases for those receiving Family Assistance allowances and Care and Protection allowances. This review will include assessment of eligibility criteria for Family Assistance, Care and Protection Allowance and Poverty Alleviation Programme. I sincerely hope that the Poverty Unit working in partnership with Social Welfare will seek to reduce the backlog of pending applications for Family Assistance and Care and Protection allowance lodged from 2006 Colleagues, I wish to conclude and reflect briefly on the recent policy position of Government relating to outsourcing. Contracting or outsourcing is being increasingly used by the public sector in developing countries for the purchase of specified services from the private sector. Contracting is an important element of health sector reform programme in many countries because it provides governments with a management and regulatory tool that creates incentives for improved performance and increased accountability. The Ministry so far conducted 2 meetings on outsourcing with a Cabinet Paper recently submitted on the same. I must state that contracting of hospital services has received favourable support from stakeholders, we still need a lot of work to do with regards to contracting of a major hospital. Needless to mention, in any form of outsourcing, Government especially with regards to primary health care will still cater for the poor, disadvantaged, rural and needy populations. Government will continue to strengthen health services in Nursing Stations, Health Centres and Subdivisional Hospitals with health cost either free or heavily subsidized. Colleagues, in the next 2 days you will be discussing key issues relating to the work of the Ministry. I wish you well in your discussions and deliberations and may we together achieve the set out objectives. With these few words, I now have the pleasure in declaring this meeting and workshop officially open. Vinaka vakalevu. ------------- |
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