Page 1042 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 28 March 1990
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facility. In other words, a fairly high level standard hospital as a third hospital; not what we are talking about which is allowing it to run down to a low level activity hospital. Therefore, the additional $41m that Mr Berry is throwing around in order to perpetuate his con is not part of the formula. The option that we have adopted is close to option 8a and the figures are there for all to see - $124m for the Woden Valley Hospital, a 700-bed hospital; and $30m to upgrade Calvary as a 300-bed hospital. That is a total of $154 million. Those are the figures we are talking about. Mr Berry can rant and rave and fantasise all he wants. That is the option that we have adopted and that Mr Humphries has ably spelt out for us.
I think it is about time that this issue was put on the table and there was a frank and open discussion about what is being proposed, so that people stop misrepresenting the situation, which is of such importance to this community. Even with the least cost option, we are still talking about expenditure of $150m of public money. On the other hand, we are making a saving of approximately $50m in capital expenditure by taking this route, and we will achieve annual savings of the order of $8.5m on the recurrent side. Those are the facts. Those are the things that we believe we can accommodate in our budget.
We do not see how we or the Opposition could have accommodated the program that the previous Government put forward. We believe that was a con. Opposition members did not know where the money was coming from; they could not explain it; they had no revenue source. They relied totally on the expectation that the Commonwealth would come good with the money. Well, all the indications are that the Commonwealth will not come good with the money. We had to devise - and we have done so - a system of hospitals to provide the requisite number of beds at a cost that we can afford. I do not believe there is any more to the debate than that.
MR MOORE (4.19): There is more to the debate than that. The other important factor that the Chief Minister seems to ignore - apart from what makes sense in terms of dollars and cents - is what the people of the ACT want.
Mr Kaine: If they cannot afford it, they cannot have it.
MR MOORE: It is true that the people of the ACT want a good fiscal policy, there is no doubt about that. But they do not want all their decisions made simply on the basis of where we can save money and make cuts. It is very clear that they want and expect the retention of some of their services and they consider some of those services to be particularly special. They also want people to be honest with them. They want those who make promises to keep those promises.
The Royal Canberra Hospital is a very emotive issue because it is very special to large numbers of people in the ACT,
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