Page 1080 - Week 04 - Thursday, 29 March 1990
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On page 20 the report also refers to the need to do more in respect of home help. I accept the committee's enjoiner there, and it was with the knowledge of this report that came down in October that when we went through the proposed HACC grants recently we proposed and secured approval from the Federal Minister to grant $202,000 to home help. That grant was to set up a personal care service and I believe it is a practical, substantive implementation of this recommendation. It was implemented, of course, before the Chief Minister gave his response on behalf of the Government, but I am sure that all members would have supported that recommendation.
Also the report emphasised the role of the carers and the carers themselves. I am pleased to say that another new project approved within the recent grants was $14,000 to the Red Cross Society to run a series of courses aimed at people caring for frail aged and younger people with disabilities in the community.
I do not think we needed any churlish comments about a lack of resolve by our Government. This report itself is a benchmark in the skills of Government here, the skills of those who work in Government and the skills particularly of the committee staff who work towards it. I think we can get by without some sharp comments.
The committee report also referred at page 60 to the needs of the terminally ill and it referred specifically to the marvellous role of the ACT Hospice Society. I think Mr Berry was at Calvary recently, during the last couple of months, when we met those people publicly. I think Mr Humphries, my colleague, was there too. It was as a result of the recommendation at page 60 and our acceptance of the Hospice Society's activities that I substantially increased their grant under another program that I surveyed shortly before Christmas last. They received a grant of $30,000.
These are pragmatic responses to issues drawn to our attention by this marvellous report. We should also acknowledge the role of the Housing Trust in our holistic approach to the concerns of the aged. The Housing Trust has 854 aged persons' units in its inventory. There is a waiting list of 236 new applicants, or thereabouts, at this time and there are about 400 tenants seeking transfer from existing dwellings. It was as a result of representations received from the Downer Residents Association and Ms Follett herself that I took unilateral steps to stop the construction of 26 aged persons' units at Downer so that the issue could be more adequately assessed in planning terms. I mean that comment as no rebuke to Ms Follett, but that means that our construction program decreased this year in the APU area. We expect to have about 50-odd in the program.
The myths regarding the old and the aged and all of those terms that apply to them were quite succinctly drawn out in a recent West Australian discussion paper on age
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