Page 2677 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 13 August 1991
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redevelopment project adopted by the Alliance Government are the very reason that Labor was unable to continue with its original plan, which it decided upon in 1989. You have to accept that, whether you like it or not.
Nobody wanted more than I to keep an acute care hospital open on the Royal Canberra Hospital site. Nobody was more anxious than I to avoid the closure of that hospital. For Mr Jensen to climb on his soapbox and talk about the Labor Party's position without mentioning the facts does no service to the Assembly. Mr Jensen should have talked about the expenditure of money by the Alliance Government, a Government of which he was a part. He was acting quite contrary to the announced policies of his own party and of the elected members of his own party. I make one exception to that, Mr Speaker: Mr Moore has always stood by the Residents Rally policy in this matter; the Residents Rally members who joined the Alliance Government did not. They are the same Residents Rally members who pressured me, when I was the Health Minister in 1989, to retain a hospital on the Royal Canberra Hospital site.
That level of hypocrisy of the Rally showed all the way through their speeches. I was most concerned at Dr Kinloch's statement because he seemed to ignore what was said in my speech on this matter. I said:
... we will locate non-acute public health facilities, including rehabilitation and aged care, convalescent facilities and the Queen Elizabeth II home for mothers and babies on the site.
That is our clear commitment. It will be considered in the context of the redevelopment timetable.
It is all very well for the Residents Rally to bleat when they themselves are the main cause of the closure of the Royal Canberra Hospital. It is very interesting, too, that the Residents Rally's most recent policy was to have a major trauma hospital on that site. Indeed, that was amongst the options examined by the review team, but it is described as non-viable. Let us be honest about it, Residents Rally members. Give us your real position, state all the facts, and I am sure you will get some support from the Labor Party. I do not mind serious criticism, but you have to be fair dinkum about it.
Mr Stevenson went on with his usual rhapsody of half-truths and referred to Rosemary Follett's speech. But he, too, avoided the issue.
Mr Stevenson: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Mr Berry's statement about half-truths is not true. Perhaps you might ask him to withdraw fully, Mr Speaker.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Stevenson, I am afraid I was distracted at the time. I will have to review the Hansard on that issue.
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