68-year-old Barry Jones went into Fiona Stanley Hospital for bowel cancer surgery - and had it cancelled after a 9 hour wait. Credit:David Allan-Petale So Mr Jones waited some more. When three o'clock ticked over - nearly nine hours after he'd arrived at Fiona Stanley Hospital - a surgeon came to see him... and sat on the end of his bed. "He said 'mate, bad news, we can't do your surgery today. There's not enough nurses on shift for us to do it. I'm sorry, but you've got to go home. The lack of nurses for operating theatre is out of bounds.' I'd been through all of that and now I was being told go home, it was ridiculous," Mr Jones said, speaking to WAtoday. "Now I'm not angry at the hospital staff. The doctors and the nurses they work bloody hard and make ends meet. But to have not enough nurses - that's just unacceptable. The government needs to fix this health system - get off their arses and stop building roads and bridges that they can slap their names on and show off with and do something real for the people."

Mr Jones said his cancelled surgery wasn't the first time he'd been let down by the $2 billion hospital. "Over Easter I was rushed there with bleeding and because it was a holiday they gave me a look over and said I just had piles. When I saw my GP he hit the roof and got me a referral to Fremantle hospital for a colonoscopy and when I woke they said straight away, bad news, it's bowel cancer." "And when it came to getting the date for the surgery I was run from pillar to post getting anything out of them. I called up and they'd lost my paperwork, found it, got me in for the pre-admission, then I got called up again saying I needed to do the pre-admission. Does the left hand talk to the right?" After being told his surgery was cancelled, Mr Jones spoke to a customer liaison officer at Fiona Stanley who helped him navigate the bureaucracy to take down what had happened and request another appointment. "I said do you people even talk to each other? And they said no, and that's the problem."

Dr Paul Mark, Acting Executive Director of Fiona Stanley Hospital said staff are working to set another surgery date for Mr Jones. "Fiona Stanley Hospital has sincerely apologised to Mr Jones for having to postpone his surgery and the distress that was caused. We are working with Mr Jones to reschedule his surgery as soon as possible." The hospital has been beset by problems since it finally opened its doors in October 2014, after it was delayed six months due to the setting up of its IT system. Patient Jared Olsen, 41, died there in March last year after he was given the wrong drug. Mr Jones said his experience of having his surgery delayed then cancelled highlights a larger problem being experienced by many people who attend the new hospital, but don't speak out.

"I can tell you from first hand experience of being through the cancer ward there it's the poor people who are suffering - the ones who can't afford private healthcare - people like me, we can't afford private health so we rely on the public system and it should be better than this. "To not have enough nurses on deck. What a disgrace. Fund these hospitals and pay the staff what they're worth and let them get on with it."