Page 2677 - Week 09 - Thursday, 9 August 1990
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press ahead with its commitment to a 24-hour crisis service for the mentally ill. That service, of course, will be available to a whole range of people and a whole range of ages. I think it will be of particular importance to young people who are starting to face life, in many cases away from the support of families, and who are tackling, sometimes for the first time by themselves, problems of mental illness in an environment which is not always very conducive to assistance.
Mr Berry: We actually now agree that it exists.
MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Berry obviously does not seem to think it is a very important issue. To this Government it is a vitally important issue.
Mr Berry: Mr Humphries has only just worked out that it exists.
Mr Kaine: Mr Berry has also only just woken up, so you have got to forgive him.
MR HUMPHRIES: It appears that he has only just woken up. I do not know what he has been doing, but we have been getting on with business in this house.
The other important context, of course, is education. Providing a context in which young people can continue to be educated in our schools is important, but unfortunately, the young on our streets are hitting the streets at increasingly young ages and it is therefore more and more critical that they be given skills necessary to integrate them into the world of work sooner rather than later.
There are efforts being made in that area which we should be very sensible of. It means that we have to take a very positive attitude towards providing those skills and not leave them until secondary colleges before we start to think about them. Unfortunately, our children are getting out of the education system well before that point in many cases.
So, I commend the response to the house. I think that it does lay the framework for very strong action in this area and, as Mr Connolly said, I share the belief that if a bipartisan approach can be developed on these issues the youth of Canberra, as elsewhere, will be much the better.
MR STEVENSON (11.50): Mr Acting Speaker, the Burdekin report was good in many respects. Its members were particularly good at collecting the data and good at measuring the problem. I feel, however, that they failed to handle some very important issues, particularly on how to prevent the problems from occurring rather than continually putting attention on what to do once they have occurred.
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