Page 3471 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 18 September 1991
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
Funding options, including pooling, are to be explored under the national health and aged care strategy. The Commonwealth would have a leadership role, in conjunction with the States, in setting national policy objectives across the pool and the States would have primary responsibility for facilitating integrated service delivery.
In anyone's terms, that is a further reinforcement of the new federalism espoused by Mr Hawke and Mr Greiner. There is much in Mr Berry's statement to indicate that there is under way an extremely important review for the future of our nation in these areas, an extremely important review in terms of the conscience of any ACT government.
We have heard that Ms Follett has stood alone on the issue of untying grants and that she has maintained a high profile, or a leading role, as one of her political admirers said. The fact was that the communique that Ms Follett signed on 30 July affirmed all government intentions to substantially reduce tied grants as a proportion of total Commonwealth grants and that the final options would be considered in November.
So, I join with Mr Berry in saying that it is very important that there be public consultation; that the community know exactly what is going on. But I hardly believe that that consultative process is aided by the type of ambiguity in the language of the statement that Mr Berry has mentioned. What we would like to know in this house is how the Follett Government views the new federalism. Does the Follett Government see it as a process of setting national policy goals and uniform standards, depending on the areas of endeavour, or does the Follett Government believe that there should be a general untying of grants and that in that process clearer responsibilities should be determined and goals set?
There is a big difference between the two. One is a laissez-faire approach with national goals and performance outcomes, and the other is an approach where the Commonwealth clearly retains the national conscience on these issues. So, I am not quite sure how we are going to have effective community consultation until the Follett Government gives a lead and indicates where it stands on the general issue.
The general issue is: After 90-odd years of federation and profound developments in the national conscience at the national level on welfare, health and associated concerns such as child-care, are we going to see a refragmentation back to immediate post-Federation days, with each State going its own way? Will this not lead ultimately to a breakdown, completely, of Commonwealth-State financial tradition, and will it not lead to a high degree of parochialism again in our nation on important issues such as this?
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .