Surgery wait times vary: report

AVERAGE elective surgery waiting times remain stable at public hospitals throughout Australia but a national comparison shows patients in some states and territories are waiting longer than others.

Data published in a Productivity Commission report on the state of Australia's health services shows that in 2012-13 2.7 per cent of Australian patients on elective surgery waiting lists had an "extended wait" of more than a year for their procedure.

The national figure is the same as for 2011-12 but a breakdown of states and territories reveals differences.

The report shows that in Tasmania 11.5 per cent of patients waited more than 12 months.

The result was up from 9.4 per cent in 2011-12.

In South Australia one per cent of patients breached the one-year wait.

"By the end of 2012-13, there were no patients overdue for elective surgery in the South Australian public health system," the SA government said in a statement to the commission.

Data was collected from 246 hospitals across Australia for the results.

"Elective surgery patients who wait longer are likely to suffer discomfort and inconvenience," the report notes.

Another section of the report looked at the number of days women spent in hospital when giving birth, finding on average that private hospital patients spent twice as long as their public hospital counterparts.

For single, uncomplicated births, new mothers in Australia spent an average 2.1 days in hospital.

In private hospitals the average stay was 3.6 days, compared with 1.8 days in the public system.

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Roache a gentleman, Kirkbride tells trial

CORONATION Street star Anne Kirkbride has told a jury that her on-screen husband William Roache was "always a perfect gentleman" around her.

Kirkbride, a stalwart of the ITV soap as Deirdre Barlow, was called as a character witness for the actor who is accused of a series of sex assaults.

Roache, 81, is accused of using his fame and popularity to exploit "starstruck" youngsters for sex in the mid to late 1960s.

He denies two counts of rape and four counts of indecent assault involving five complainants aged 16 and under between 1965 and 1971.

Giving evidence from the witness box at Preston Crown Court, Kirkbride was asked what one word she would use to describe Roache and replied: "Lovely."

Kirkbride said she had never seen anything worrying about Roache's behaviour on set with young women from when she joined the show in about 1972.

The actress swore on the Bible and then chose to stand as she was asked a number of questions by defending barrister Louise Blackwell QC.

She confirmed she had known Roache "for quite some time", after she started in the soap aged 17 or 18.

Kirkbride was asked how she felt on joining Coronation Street.

She replied: "I was terrified for my first day. Very nervous going.

"It was a completely new situation. I didn't know anybody.

"I very quickly got to know people and it became easier."

Asked what she thought of Roache on meeting him, she said he was friendly.

"I remember the first time I spoke to him was outside a lift and we had a really nice chat and he offered me a cigarette," she said.

"We shared a lot of the same interests in spiritual things. I just found him very easy to talk to."

Blackwell asked her: "At that time, if you had one word to describe Mr Roache what would it be?"

She replied: "Lovely."

Roache smiled in the dock as she made the comment.

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New treatment may help ADHD sufferers

NUTRIENTS may become a new treatment option for ADHD sufferers after a study found the treatment was much more effective than placebo.

The University of Canterbury trial is the first to show the benefits of micronutrients for ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) sufferers is not just due to the placebo effect, the author of the study Professor Julia Rucklidge said.

She said trial participants often get better as they're being cared for by clinicians, so it was important to compare micronutrients with placebo.

About five per cent of Kiwis suffer from ADHD and some children can't tolerate or don't respond to regular medications.

"The study needs to be replicated before we can give clear advice to people affected by ADHD," Dr Rucklidge said.

"However, if replicated, it will offer people with ADHD another treatment option."

Dr Rucklidge said participants taking the nutrients had no adverse effects.

Nutrients have been used as a treatment for a range of ailments, particularly mental illness, for decades, but there is a lack of scientific research to support the treatment, she said.

"As such, many scientists and clinicians have dismissed nutrients as a viable way forward due to this unfortunate history."

Dr Rucklidge plans to run a similar trial with ADHD children, and is also testing the benefits of nutrient treatments for people with depression, sleep problems and addictions.

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Rice farmers add to Thai govt woes

Thai caretaker PM Yingluck Shinawatra is facing a challenge from more than a million rice farmers. Source: AAP

BESIEGED by anti-government protests in Bangkok for the past three months, embattled caretaker Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra is facing another challenge in the countryside, from more than a million angry rice farmers.

Yingluck's Pheu Thai Party won the last general election in 2011 on a populist platform anchored by a pledge to buy every single grain of rice grown by farmers at above-market, fixed prices.

Two and a half years later, the government is now faced with a debt of about 100 billion baht ($A3.4 billion) to 1.4 million farmers who have yet to be paid for their main rice crop, sold to the government in October.

The main opposition party is boycotting the election, so Yingluck's party is expected to win comfortably even with the rice problems.

"Farmers in Phichit are apathetic about the polls," said Banjong Phichitwilailert, a community leader.

"The candidates haven't been campaigning here because they are afraid that they won't be able to answer our questions."

Thousands of farmers in Phichit, 310 kilometres north of Bangkok, are owed 7 billion baht for their crop, Banjong said.

"About 10,000 farmers were paid this week, but 40,000 are still owed money," he said.

In neighbouring Phitsanulok province, rice farmers' groups have given the government until Friday to assure payment.

"On Friday we will meet with the governor," said Piak Phusrithaet.

"If he doesn't guarantee payments we will either shut down City Hall or march on Bangkok. We have been waiting for our money for four months."

Yingluck's caretaker government is trying to arrange loans from commercial banks to pay the farmers before the elections but observers doubt the full 100 billion baht can be raised quickly.

Farmers are only one group causing a headache for the government over the rice scheme.

Earlier this month, the National Anti-Corruption Commission opened an investigation into Yingluck for failing to halt the scheme.

On January 16, it brought corruption charges against former commerce minister Boonsong Teriyaporn and 14 other officials for their involvement in the program.

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Swimmer missing in NSW river

A search is underway in the Hawkesbury River north of Sydney after a swimmer failed to surface. Source: AAP

A SEARCH is under way for a swimmer missing in the Hawkesbury River north of Sydney.

Police say a group of friends were swimming in the river, west of the Windsor Bridge, just before 6pm (AEDT) on Wednesday when a man got into difficulty.

Emergency services were called to the scene after the man, believed to be 22, failed to surface.

A police helicopter and PolAir are searching the area.

Police divers are en route.

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Debate on urban projects helpful: Access

EDS: Not to be used until 0001 AEDT, Thursday January 30

By Colin Brinsden, AAP Economics Correspondent

CANBERRA, Jan 30 AAP - At a time of a fading mining investment boom, Deloitte Access Economics is pleased to see policymakers discussing Australia's creaking urban infrastructure.

The independent forecaster's latest Investment Monitor highlights the peaking nature of the resource-related investment spending with definite projects in the final months of 2013 posting the biggest drop since the depths of the 2008-2009 global financial crisis.

However, Deloitte Access Economics partner Stephen Smith notes in the report on Thursday that public infrastructure, particularly for transport, has been the focus of considerable discussion in Australia over the past few months.

The federal government has directed the Productivity Commission to examine major infrastructure projects, drawing organisations such as Infrastructure Australia, the Reserve Bank of Australia and the Business Council of Australia into the debate.

"That the state of Australia's creaking urban infrastructure is stirring the passions of Australian policymakers gives hope that a more efficient system of identifying, assessing, financing and constructing public infrastructure may be in store," Mr Smith said.

"However, there is also a risk that any policy changes are designed with short term growth risks rather than the longer term sustainability of infrastructure spending in mind."

The report shows the value of definite projects - those under construction or committed - dropped by almost $25 billion over the December quarter, the most significant quarterly fall since the December quarter 2008. Definite projects over the year were down 1.2 per cent.

Mr Smith said not a single new liquified natural gas (LNG) project began construction over 2013, although there was a further $2 billion cost blowout for the Gorgon LNG project.

The value of planned projects - those under consideration or possible - rose by more than $17.5 billion over the quarter.

However, a $40 billion increase in the value of projects under consideration was partly offset by a $22.3 billion fall in the value of possible projects.

Overall, the total value of projects at their various stages fell 0.8 per cent compared to the September quarter - or $7.4 billion to $866.3 billion - to be down 9.2 per cent over the year.

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Aust could take big role in nuke security

IT'S the nightmare terror scenario: an extremist group building its own atomic bomb and detonating it without warning in Sydney or New York.

A new study by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) says it's tempting to think that the risks of nuclear terrorism are overblown.

"They aren't," ASPI says.

"If terrorists were able to overcome the still relatively significant challenges involved in the fabrication and successful detonation of an improvised nuclear device, the consequences could be catastrophic."

Authors Dr Tanya Ogilvie-White and Dr David Santoro said there were three pathways to nuclear terrorism.

Terrorists could acquire a ready-made bomb from military stocks; acquire materials to make their own improvised bomb; or they could attack or sabotage an existing nuclear facility or transportation to release radioactive material.

The paper says there's low-risk of such attack in Australia, although in 2005 police arrested a group of Islamic extremists who planned to attack the Lucas Heights reactor. But an attack anywhere in the world would still have consequences for Australia.

ASPI said Australia had internationally well-regarded technical and diplomatic expertise in non-proliferation.

Yet the former Labor government had cancelled the flagship Regional Security of Radiological Sources Project, launched in 2004.

Under that program, international experts worked under Australian leadership with regulatory bodies across South-East Asia to secure dangerous radioactive sources used in the health and industrial sectors. They also worked to develop plans to respond to nuclear attacks or sabotage.

ASPI said the government should now launch a new nuclear security strategy, including relaunching the Regional Security of Radiological Sources Project.

At a modest cost of around $2 million a year this would reduce the danger of nuclear terrorism and give Australia an international leadership role.

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Fruit processor seeks govt help

SPC Ardmona needs some "real encouragement" from the federal government to stave off closure of Australia's last major fruit processor.

Federal cabinet will meet on Thursday to discuss a proposal for a one-off grant of $25 million, which would be coupled with $25 million from the Victorian government and $150 million in new investment from SPC's parent company Coca-Cola Amatil (CCA).

The investment would help the company introduce new technology and products, as it faces pressures from the high Australian dollar and a flood of cheap imported goods.

Late last year the government appointed a panel comprising business chiefs Catherine Livingstone and Dick Warburton and former Labor minister Greg Combet to report on the best way to help the Victorian-based company.

A CCA spokeswoman told AAP the panel had been impressed with the company's new product ideas and innovations and there had been a number of productive meetings with Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane and Victorian Deputy Premier Peter Ryan.

Asked whether there was a real prospect of the operations closing, the spokeswoman told AAP: "This will be a decision for the CCA board."

"They need some real encouragement to fund their very large investment and indications that the problems we've seen in managing the free market in this country - such as real reform on dumping - will also be addressed."

Liberal MP Sharman Stone, who represents the Murray electorate where the processor is based, said about 3000 jobs would be impacted by any closure.

Comments by Treasurer Joe Hockey on Wednesday suggest he's unlikely to support a rescue package.

"If we are asking the Australian people to help the government live within its means then corporate Australia must also follow," Mr Hockey told the ABC.

He said SPC's parent company made a profit of more than $200 million in the first six months of the financial year but there was a request for $50 million of taxpayers' money.

"I think you can understand why we are being very cautious, very careful about handing out taxpayers' money to companies that are profitable, let alone companies that aren't profitable."

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