The Labour Government should be valuing midwives more than their own ideology, National’s Health spokesperson Dr Shane Reti says.

Answers to written questions show $60 million of maternity money has been put aside for Labour’s health system restructure.

“No wonder midwives are feeling undervalued, not only is Labour unwilling to stump up the extra cash for them, but it’s taking money away from the sector to pay for its bureaucratic restructure.

“All up Labour is spending $486 million on the health restructure, which is only going to create layer upon layer of bureaucracy when what we actually need is more doctors, nurses and money for cancer drugs.

“Kiwis value our midwives more and our health workforce more than they value Labour’s need for more bureaucrats in Wellington.

“Labour is spending billions of taxpayer dollars but we aren’t seeing any results.

“KiwiBuild is still a failure. Light Rail still hasn’t left the station. There are still 4000 children living in motels. Kids aren’t turning up to school. There has been barely any progress on the new inpatient mental health facilities.

“Every dollar Labour directs into its ideological restructure is a dollar that isn’t available to pay for cancer drugs, for nurses, midwives and doctors.”

You can find the answer to a Written Parliamentary Question (WPQ) here.