Page 102 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 8 April 1992
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MR HUMPHRIES: The Alliance Government did go down the path of developing the pilot program that Mrs Carnell referred to. We did do that in government. It is now up to this Government to do something about the work that the former Government did.
Mr Berry: Yes, clean up the mess. That is what we have done. We have nearly all of it done.
MR HUMPHRIES: Your job is to put in place the program that you promised back in August of 1991. Are you going to do it? Madam Speaker, I have my doubts. I detect a very strong element of backsliding on the part of this Minister. We have had no clear statement from the Minister that he intends to do what he promised to do last August, before the election. We have had no clear indication that he intends to deliver what he has promised.
The amendment itself, I am afraid, spells out to me a great danger of backsliding, and I am afraid that I would like to know what it is that the Minister intends to do and when he intends to do it. It is not much to ask. It has been on the drawing board, presumably, since last August. Presumably, you have some idea of what is going on. Presumably, you know something about what is being developed by your department in this area. You have not told us anything about it in the Assembly today, which leads me to the view that, in fact, some kind of backflip is being prepared on this matter.
Mr Berry promises us confidently, "When I say that I will do something, I will do it". Madam Speaker, I am still waiting for the fifth ambulance he promised more than a year ago. Where is the fifth ambulance? I am still waiting for the additional beds you said the system needed before you took office last June. I am still waiting for the shorter hospital waiting lists, rather than the longer hospital waiting lists we have been delivered under your administration. In particular, I am waiting to see the end to the budget blow-outs that you said would not occur under your Government - - -
Mr Berry: They haven't.
MR HUMPHRIES: It has occurred under your Government. I am waiting to see all that, Madam Speaker. Mr Berry says that it is not going to happen. I am afraid that I have to get out my prediction that it will happen, and, indeed, it is going to happen very soon.
Madam Speaker, I think it is worth reflecting that methadone is an important tool in our fight against the increase in the harm associated with the use of drugs in our community. There is strong evidence that there needs to be an increase in the opportunities for patients to take part in that program. There clearly are more people wanting places than the number we can provide under the present arrangements. I as Minister fielded a number of pleas from members of the community wanting either themselves or close relatives to be involved in the program when they could not be involved. I think that the arguments in many cases were quite telling. Often I was told by my department that there was no space on the program and therefore the request had to be put to one side.
I think it is worth saying, though, that I am a little bit less starry-eyed, perhaps, than Mr Moore about methadone. Methadone, as Mr Moore pointed out, is, in fact, a drug. It falls in the continuum between tobacco and alcohol and heroin and LSD and other drugs. It is in that continuum. It is a drug; and having
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