Angry families still waiting for answers

I JUST WANT TO SEE MY GIRL

CONFUSION reigns over who is setting the $17 daily fees at the Gold Coast University Hospital car park as anger increases among vulnerable families stung by the exorbitant prices.

In a conflicting series of emails, private car park owner Secure Parking said it was “engaged to manage the car park operations only and do not control the car park fees”.

But the State Government, which has a 30-year deal with Secure, said the car park had a Yesterday’s Gold Coast Bulletin

cap on fee rises, normally set in line with CPI.

“Price increases are the only aspect of pricing covered in the commercial-in-confidence contract with Secure Parking for the ownership and operation of the GCUH carpark,” a spokeswoman said.

Secure Parking did not answer Bulletin questions on whether it would lower its daily fees or talk to the State Government. The parking company has also declined to reveal the annual profit it made off the hospital car park.

The issue blew up this week when Gold Coast mother Donna Watts Smith told the Bulletin she could not visit her sick daughter Sammie in hospital every day because of the $17-a-day parking fees. Sammie has cystic fibrosis and is often in hospital for weeks on end.

“Of course I would like to go up there every day,” Ms Watts Smith said. “But $17 is super expensive and you end up paying into the hundreds by the end of the week. I am at the point where I go every second day to avoid the costs. I don’t think private companies should be able to make money out of people’s misery.”

The Palaszczuk Government last year committed $7.5 million over four years for parking concessions, which supply more than 1200 GCUH patients a month with a $5 parking discount.

However, it does not help people such as Ms Watts Smith, who is neither a patient nor carer.

Pimpama mother Teagan Piercy said she was stung $30-60 a week during her pregnancy.

“I had a pregnancy with a lot of complications so I was there for plenty of scans and midwife appointments,” she said, adding that public transport was a cheaper option but was not ideal for the elderly or the heavily pregnant.