Page 1028 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 28 March 1990
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and economic diversification with the ACT but it will also reinforce our status as a partner at the State level in Australia. It will reinforce our own notion of our identity as a self-governing Territory. In my view, it will mark our maturity. I expect great benefits from our focus on these programs and forums - benefits to ACT industry and the economy, benefits to ACT research institutions and benefits to the community. I move:
That the Assembly takes note of the paper.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
ACT PUBLIC HEALTH SYSTEM
Discussion of Matter of Public Importance
MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: I have received a letter from Mr Berry proposing that a matter of public importance be submitted to the Assembly for discussion, namely:
The failure of the Kaine-Collaery-Duby Government to ensure a strong, viable and accessible public health system for the people of the ACT.
MR BERRY (3.29): This matter of public importance is, of course, a matter of grave concern for the people of Canberra and, as you, Mr Deputy Speaker, properly announced, it is about the failure of the Kaine-Collaery-Duby Government to ensure a strong, viable and accessible public health system for the people of the ACT. This matter relates fundamentally to the Government's decision on hospital restructuring which Mr Humphries announced yesterday. It also relates to remarks that were made by Mr Humphries this morning in relation to the privatisation, if you like, of obstetrics in the ACT.
Mr Deputy Speaker, Labor received a steering committee report which I tabled in this Assembly on 24 August 1989. That report was based on advice from professional planners and a wide cross-section of the community with expertise in health and planning, including representatives of the trade union movement. That report carefully weighed up the costs and the needs of a hospital system in the ACT after broad consultations. It gave a commitment to start the redevelopment and find the funds and that is the fundamental failing of the Government opposite. It has still given no commitment to finding the funds and certainly the only commitment that it has given is to abandon Royal Canberra Hospital.
We have heard a lot said by Government Ministers about the lack of funds and the overfunding identified by the Grants Commission. One thing we have not heard anything about is the lack of income identified by the Grants Commission. We are 40 per cent underfunded in the area of taxes. If the Government were to bring the Territory into line with the
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