Page 3334 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 18 September 1990
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jobs cut out of the public nursing home at Jindalee. The Government has already made it clear that that will happen.
This is a Government that came into power with the assistance of people who had pledged themselves to support the public hospital system - and I refer particularly to Mr Jensen, Mr Collaery and Dr Kinloch. They pledged themselves in particular to ensure that the Royal Canberra Hospital stayed open and that the Liberal members opposite would not therefore be able to destroy the delivery of public hospital services in the ACT to help their private sector mates. But the Residents Rally, the one per cent party, or less than one per cent party, turned around on that promise, ratted on their promise to the community and set out wilfully to destroy the public hospital system, the same as they have done with the education system. They ratted on their promise to the community in relation to the education system, and I am sure that Mr Wood will have something to say about that in due course.
The fact of the matter is that the Government opposite in its budget has done nothing but demonstrate its ineptitude in the provision of progressive public services in the ACT. It has proved its ignorance on the issue of social justice, Mr Collaery, and I think its ignorance has been reflected in the way it has treated the public services in the Territory, particularly the hospital system. By the end of the term of this Government people will have started to feel the pinch. Already waiting lists for surgery are growing, and that is as a direct result of the actions of the Government members opposite. They are inflicting pain and suffering on the people of the community while they get on with their agenda of ripping down the public hospital system. There is no doubt about that.
At the same time they have spent a whole stack of money to ensure that the people of Canberra get something that they do not want. And that is the real issue. This Government opposite is a government that the people do not want. So, in accordance with that theme, the people of Canberra not only have to suffer a Government that they never wanted in the first place, but now have to suffer reduced services because of the actions and laziness of the members opposite.
MR CONNOLLY (5.02): Mr Deputy Speaker, in the debate on the Appropriation Bill it is appropriate for the Opposition to both raise general concerns about the Government's budgetary strategy and focus on the particular area of portfolio responsibility of the Opposition spokespersons. I do not want to dwell extensively tonight on the general overview of the budget because that has been done very effectively by Ms Follett, as Leader of the Opposition, and by other speakers. It is clearly a lazy budget; it is a budget which is hacking into the services and standards of this community; it is a budget which is universally condemned by the community, who see a Government that has no mandate to govern.
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