CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
An aging medical professional who has forsaken retirement to continue selflessly helping people in the bush, has today spoken of his surprise to learn about the number one Federal issue occupying all of the manpower and political capital of his elected representatives.
As the only doctor in a rural New South Wales shire the size of Tasmania, Dr Con Hannant (79) thought his National MPs and Senators would probably be more focused on removing the asbestos from the ceilings of the yellowing hospital he has worked in for 50 years.
Or maybe phasing out the post-war bed sheets that his one nurse is still required to boil in a pot.
He even though they might want to find someone to replace him eventually. But that doesn’t look like it’s happening, because like majority of Australia’s rural services and infrastructure – Con’s hospital won’t be getting one cent unless someone finds some coal or CSG seams in the dirt floor courtyard.
“Yeah. I’m pretty much only good for broken limbs and grazes nowadays” he says.
“It’s not that I haven’t treated far more serious ailments throughout my career… It’s just that I can’t deliver babies with my arthritis anymore.”
“And you can’t really attract any young specialists to a rural town with a high school that only goes to year ten, and a salary that pays less than the local teenagers who run off to the gas fields”
“So basically if it can’t be treated with plaster or bandages, it’s a job for the flying doctors. That’s if you’re lucky, anyone seeking ongoing treatment are at the mercy of Alan Joyce’s rural price gouging”
With an entire regional community relying on him to live forever, Dr Hannant says he was astonished to learn that the National Party had spent the last six months doing nothing but campaigning against the constitutional recognition of his most vulnerable patients.
“I mean. They’ll argue that they can’t do much in Opposition but to fire shots at the Government. I do find it bizarre that this is their number one concern. Because my number one concern is breaking a hip when one of these Harold Holt-era ceiling tiles collapses from roof”
“But when they were in power for 10 years we’d only see them every election cycle anyway”
“I probably should have said all this to their face. But then again, I’d never get near them. They’d usually pose with whichever farmer had suffered an injury minor enough to be treated here.”
“Anyway, I’ve gotta go. The bloke delivering our new tub of leeches is in the car park apparently”
