NSW Premier Kristina Keneally has urged her state and territory counterparts - and the Prime Minister - not to abandon hospital reform should the federal government's proposal flop next week.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd wants premiers and chief ministers to agree to his health plan by the Council of Australian Governments meeting on Monday.
However Victorian Premier John Brumby remains defiantly opposed to Labor's health and hospital reform package.
Ms Keneally said her staff were still doing the maths on the complex plan, only completely unveiled earlier this week.
She pled with the nation's leaders not to abandon negotiations over the proposal if a deal wasn't done.
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"I would certainly urge all state and territory leaders, including the Commonwealth, to not let this fail simply because it's complex," she told ABC TV on Wednesday.
"This proposal shouldn't fall over at the first hurdle simply because all of the complexity has not yet been resolved."
While Ms Keneally has concerns about Mr Rudd's move to take back 30 per cent of GST revenue from the states in return for becoming the majority funder of public hospitals, she conceded there was some new money for NSW in the package.
"There is certainly and undeniably money that's been announced in the last few days that represents additional commonwealth investment, that is in those first four years," she said.
"(But) if you look forward ... it would appear at first analysis that the only new money that comes in is if you assume hospital growth - the spending - grows faster than the growth in the rate of the GST."
Ms Keneally is also worried about how the plan will address mental and dental health issues, but the bottom line was cash.
"It does come down to, `Is there new money in here for NSW?'" she said.
"We would say the best outcome is a pool whereby the states, the territories, and the Commonwealth put their money into a pool arrangement."
At present, Ms Keneally said Labor's desire to have emergency hospital patients treated within four hours was a financially unviable dream for the state.
"It would appear there's not enough (money) for NSW to actually meet that target," she said.
"How do we meet that target? We need more beds in our hospitals (and) we are not yet confident that the funding is there to make that happen."
In an eleventh hour attempt to come to a decision on Mr Rudd's health care reform plan, Ms Keneally will convene a special NSW cabinet meeting on Friday.
As part of it, state treasurer Eric Roozendaal will make a presentation on the financial implications for NSW of the Commonwealth's proposals.
