National takes $90 million awarded for Wairarapa Masterton Hospital - for itself

Kieran McAnulty’s revelation this week that National took an estimated $90 million awarded for the remediation of Wairarapa Masterton Hospital to fill their own budget doesn’t surprise.

But it is disappointing.

Health NZ saw a remediation lawsuit for the hospital reach Wellington High Court in July 2023, and it was ultimately successful in its bid.

But instead of using the settlement funds to fix the hospital’s defects and structural instability, National took it to fill their own budget - a budget that is premised on billions for landlords, readies billions for foreign fossil fuel companies, and hundreds of millions for multinational tobacco companies (mainly benefiting Philip Morris, Bishop’s former employer, which reportedly and successfully targeted NZ First).

Simeon Brown tried to conceal this Wairarapa hospital information for almost a year until the Ombudsman intervened.

Local MP McAnulty has been fighting for transparency for the entire time.

As McAnulty makes clear this week:

“The last estimate was that we are 40 nurses short and they are not allowed to hire.

So not only are they overworked but they are working in unsafe conditions that this government got money to fix and they took it.

They took it to fill the hole in their budget.

It is shameful, it is deceitful, and it is a genuine scandal.”

In September, Wairarapa doctors spoke up about concerns, with one surgeon, Dr French, telling local media:

“We know the Government has its metrics. But fundamentally, you can’t increase production in the factory if you don’t staff it and resource it.”

To add insult to injury, it was revealed that same month that Simeon Brown specifically excluded Wairarapa from a $100 million fund it announced to keep hospitals chugging along - funding that comes off the back of up to ~$2 billion of cuts National has forced onto our public health system since they came into power.

And more: another half a billion dollar ($500 million) cut for hospitals and public health announced on Wednesday while funnelling taxpayer wealth to corporate/private health.

Ho Ho Ho - the ‘gifts’ never stop under the National Party, mostly delivered on Friday evenings, weekends, or during the Christmas period when most have their attention elsewhere.

McAnulty’s Masterton Hospital news broke on Tuesday, and as at the time of writing, no publication has covered it.

There has however been plenty of noise about the faux battle between Taxpayers Union Chair and former Finance Minister Ruth Richardson and National’s Nicola Willis ( with the latest that Richardson has “pulled out”).

Priorities and distraction, after all.

Wairarapa, in a severe seismic hazard and flooding zone, deserves better.

So do the hardworking doctors and nurses, and Kiwi residents.

Even with the various deferrals and “re-allocations” taken from hard working Kiwis - e.g. pay equity amounting to $13 billion, cuts to disabled family entitlements, cuts to transport subsidies for elderly, “saving money” on near homeless by forcing more Kiwis into cars and streets than ever, cuts to police budgets etc., National are still tracking to significantly more debt than Labour.

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Wairarapa not the only victim of National budget re-allocations

National’s multiple hospital builds deferred in office include: Dunedin Ōtepoti, Whangarei, Nelson Whakatū.

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