Ahead of a meeting between the Rural Doctors Association Australia and the Federal Health Minister, Mark Butler, Vice President of the RDA Tasmania, Dr Ben Dodds said the state was under pressure as a health service to deliver specialist care and that locum contracts were the highest he had ever seen.

As a result, the cost of the average locum contract had increased upwards of 50 per cent with some contracts in the state going for $3500, among the highest rates in Australia.

"We have a shortage of staff specialists in Tasmania to deliver that care and we're at the point now where we have such a crisis, the health service is scrambling to try and attract doctors where they can," Dr Dodds said.

Dr Dodds said creating workplaces where trainees don't feel like they're being valued and overworked was a major challenge in retaining doctors.

"I think we are culminating towards a crisis point in terms of the availability of doctors. What we need is strong training networks within Tasmania for a variety of specialties.

AMA Tasmania EBA Lead Negotiator, Dr Michael Lumsden-Steel, said locums in Tasmania were costing the state $38 million a year.

"Locum doctors are probably earning, on average, between two and three times what it costs to have a salaried staff specialist doctor," he said.

"For one locum doctor, you could be employing one full time specialist, maybe two, maybe maybe three, at least two and a half.

Dr Lumsden-Steel said the lack of staff at the LGH was the single biggest problem facing the health sector in the North.

"The LGH and Northwest regional hospitals are effectively becoming a shell, which has got a fly in/fly out workforce operating within it and that's not sustainable. It doesn't build a culture and it doesn't build an environment that attracts and retains people.

"It's also the moral burnout from feeling like you're not able to provide the best care you can because we are so stretched," he said.

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Secretary, Department of Health and State Health Commander, Kathrine Morgan-Wicks, said the use of locum doctors in Tasmania was necessary to ensure the continued delivery of essential health services.

"Rates of payment for locum contracts vary depending on a number of factors, including market rates, location, and the specialty being undertaken," Ms Morgan-Wicks said.

"We acknowledge the pressures in the health system as a result of COVID, and have increased health staffing levels by 1351 full-time employees over the past two years, from July 2020 to June 2022. This includes doctors, nurses, paramedics and allied health professionals.

Ms Morgan-Wicks said Tasmania was competing with other states and territories for health staff, but were taking proactive measures to recruit and retain skilled professionals.

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"Last year, the Health Recruitment Taskforce was convened to review and improve recruitment across the public health system in Tasmania. The Taskforce included representation from the AMA and health unions including the ANMF, CPSU and HACSU.

"The Taskforce has considered matters such as a review of national base salaries and comparison of Tasmanian base salary rates, streamlining recruitment processes, and a focus on the attraction and retention of nursing and medical graduates. These matters are also being considered in wage negotiations which are underway," she said.

Dr Lumsden-Steel described the taskforce as "a box ticking exercise".

"From our point of view, that was a complete waste of time and smoke and mirrors," he said.

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"We basically went in there and said, look, you're not in the market to attract and retain healthcare workers, you need to pay more and you need to address the situations in the workplace to create a positive, vibrant workplace.

In February 2022, the then-federal health minister, Greg Hunt, was asked by the Member for Clark, Andrew Wilkie, what was being done to help Tasmania, after a report ranked the state's health system among the worst in the country.

Mr Hunt said the Australian government had contributed to significant increase and expansion in Tasmanian hospital capacity and funding, which included a 75 per cent increase of funding in the health system.

"We've gone from $291 million in the year prior to coming to government, to $511 million, a 75 per cent increase," Mr Hunt said.

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"That will increase significantly over the course of the current five-year hospital agreement which will see an approximate $615 million increase against the last agreement, over this five year period," he said.

Dr Lumsden-Steel said that the federal government and state governments needed to agree on what funding needed to be for the public hospitals to meet the public hospital demand.

"Tasmania probably needs an urgent increase of between two and $300 million a year if not more in the state hospital system," he said.

Today, the meeting between RDAA president Dr Megan Belot and Mark Butler will discuss the need for new initiatives to attract more doctors to rural and remote locations.

"We need to make general practice and Rural Medicine careers of choice for our own medical graduates, and we need that to start with the Government's implementation of a range of new and expanded initiatives, over and above the original $146 million package," Dr Belot said.

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