Page 3126 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 10 September 1991
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It is also worth noting, Mr Speaker, that, despite the many problems the Territory faces in funding senses, we were able to achieve a quite significant extension and expansion of services available to territorians. These services are listed on page 3 of the report. They are: An extension of the Women's Health Service to include an extra social worker; the extension of the Migrant Health Service so that non-English speaking clients can obtain education and information services, as well as interpreter services; the strengthening of the Child Abuse Assessment Clinic at RCH North; the development of a 24-hour Mental Health Crisis Service, to which I have already referred; the provision of a group house at Lyneham for young people with intellectual disabilities; and the replacement and upgrading of outdated equipment in public hospitals. All those things have been going on all the time and, of course, continue to go on each year as we identify new areas of need.
The fifth area of great personal pride to me has been the area of reform in tobacco law. The Territory took up and finally implemented in that year a package of legislation designed to provide the toughest anti-tobacco regime in the whole country. We, as a result of the Tobacco (Amendment) Bill of earlier last year, were able to provide for the effective banning of advertising of tobacco products in the Territory, greater restriction on sales to minors and encouragement to minors not to take up smoking, and, of course, the establishment of the Health Promotion Fund as a way of replacing tobacco sponsorships and of positively encouraging research and promotion of health in this Territory.
That is a matter of great pride not just for me but for all those who have been involved in the development of that package. Finally, I was pleased to be involved in the beginning of the corporatisation of the Mitchell Health Services Supply Centre, an important step towards making that white elephant productive and useful to the Territory in a way which it has not been since its establishment more than 10 years ago.
However, all those positive things should not be seen to suggest that there is only good news on the horizon. There are a number of ongoing problems in health referred to in this report, which we have to deal with in the not too distant future. Briefly, they include the registration of professions in the Territory and the question of whether new professions or professional areas ought to be admitted to the present list of those registered; and the question of whether AIDS is a notifiable disease and the way in which the Territory handles the whole question of dealing with those who are either infected with AIDS or might be in a particular occupation or position where their exposure to AIDS should be regularly tested for.
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