Page 1044 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 28 March 1990
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press on this issue. That is a very good question, and I hope that the media pursue Mr Donohue to find out the truth about his resignation from the Residents Rally. Is it that he can no longer stand the litany of broken promises? Does he wish to retain his own integrity?
As I said earlier, the Royal Canberra Hospital is an emotive issue that is important to people. All of us, when we are looking at our own homes or looking at our own personal budgets, realise that we have to live within our means. According to a number of academics and public servants to whom I have spoken, the ACT budget, unlike a Federal budget, has many similarities with a home budget. If you borrow too much you face the consequences. The Chief Minister mentioned this earlier and I strongly support his notion of not over-borrowing. However, if you want something special - if you decide that you do not want a Holden, you want a Fairlane - then you must be prepared to hold out, to change, to look for ways to raise the money in order to buy that something special. It is very clear that there are some things that are special to the people of Canberra. Among those special things are the Royal Canberra Hospital and the education system, both of which are under threat. When things like this are under threat, most importantly and significantly, morale breaks down.
The Minister for Health, Education and the Arts is a decisive person. I disagree with a lot of what he says, but at least he deals with matters decisively and follows his party's policies. He will find that he will have to handle low morale in the nursing profession and particularly low morale in the teaching profession - an area that I am more familiar with because many of my friends are in it. When you get low morale you lose input - teachers will stop taking work home. Members should just stand by a school gate in the morning or afternoon when the teachers come in and leave and have a look at the armfuls of books and papers that they take home to mark. You should talk to them about morale! Ask the teachers and the nurses what they are thinking about at the moment. Once you have that sort of low morale you do not get service delivery, you get just the opposite.
What we have seen from this Government is an attack on those areas instead of support. Instead of taking appropriate decisions about raising the money, this Government is looking for the weakest areas so that it can cut the money. That, of course, is the major problem in terms of the Royal Canberra Hospital. Many Canberrans were born in that hospital and there are many who have gone there to have their children, as we discussed this morning. The Royal Canberra Hospital offered a special sort of service in obstetrics to mothers. It is that sort of special service that is not offered at other hospitals which makes Royal Canberra a very special and important hospital to people. The Government must never underestimate just how important it is. It has cast the die with an almost complete lack of community consultation
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