He travelled to Mount Isa on Wednesday with registered nurse and LNP MP Ros Bates and opposition health spokesman Mark McArdle to look at the health needs of the region.

While the new upgrade was on the agenda, Dr Douglas said it would be money badly spent.

“No form of renovation will bring this hospital up to the standard it should be,” he said.

“It needs to be knocked down and started from scratch.”

Mr McArdle said the hospital was well past its used-by date.

“The facilities here are of the same standard as those that were in the Townsville Hospital on Eyre Street. That was demolished five years ago because it was deemed not up to standard.

Mr McArdle said local hospital boards needed to be reinstated to ensure decisions were made on a local level.

“The people that work in Mount Isa are the people who know what the issues are, there is no point making those decisions from Brisbane,” he said.

“And at the moment, the funding just isn’t getting out here.”

Mr McArdle’s comment comes after local health professionals in the city claimed the upgrade would fail to attract doctors to the hospital.

Rural Doctors Association Queensland president Sheilagh Cronin told The North West Star last week that double the money funded in the upgrade would only barely cover the renovations that were needed at the hospital.