Page 3156 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 12 September 1990
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It is a joke. It has failed to deliver important money for the delivery of services to the people of the ACT and, in this case, the mentally ill - the disadvantaged; that is the sort of people that these people have attacked from the outset.
This Minister claimed, quite erroneously, that the money was not good enough - and in a little while we will come to the amount that he has provided and the big fibs that have been poured on the community by this Minister in relation to the provision of services to the mentally ill. But first of all - - -
Mr Humphries: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Mr Berry said something about fibs, and I think "fibs" is a thinly disguised version of "lies". I would ask that he withdraw that statement.
MR SPEAKER: Your position is upheld. Mr Berry, please withdraw that.
MR BERRY: Mr Speaker, a fib is in fact a lie. I did not say that Mr Humphries fibbed; I said that fibs had been imposed on the community in relation to - - -
MR SPEAKER: No, you did say "by this Minister". I would ask you to withdraw that; it was a personal reflection.
MR BERRY: I have nothing to withdraw, but if it pleases Mr Humphries I will withdraw it.
MR SPEAKER: Thank you. Please proceed.
MR BERRY: The fact of the matter is that the efforts of this Minister, and in particular Mr Bernard Collaery's efforts on the Belconnen Remand Centre, are disgraceful. This Minister - and I suspect that he will have a bit of a crack later on - failed to do anything with the provision of services for mentally ill remandees, and in fact money from that budget has also been rolled over into this one.
He has also persisted with his approach to corrective services: lock them up and throw away the key - out of sight, out of mind. What did you do with the rehabilitation services at the Belconnen Remand Centre? You closed them down; that is what you did. What you are about is locking them away and throwing away the key - out of sight, out of mind. That is what this Government is about, and that is the way it has treated the mentally ill. The fact of the matter is that in a full year Labor's allocation would have resulted in $600,000 going to the provision of mental health services in the ACT. It would have produced a first class service, not a second rate service such as the one this Minister has tried to impose on the people of the ACT - something nearer to a first class service than this Minister even pretends he is interested in.
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