Page 2055 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 8 September 1992
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MR BERRY: Not between the Government and the course you have chosen, I have to add. The choice really is one for members in this Assembly to make when the Bill comes before the house in the in-principle debate. The standing orders provide that immediately after the Bill has been agreed to in principle a member may move that the Bill be referred to a select or standing committee.
Mr Moore: That is why we suspend standing orders - to save time so that your Bill can move through quickly, to the benefit of the users.
MR BERRY: That is right. What the Government has proposed will be of benefit to users, but it is aimed at ensuring that the public sector maintains this program in an environment that is properly regulated. Proper regulation, of course, comes from the public sector, not the Pharmacy Guild or some other group. It is properly regulated by the public sector.
Mr Moore seeks to refer this matter to his committee. He really has a choice to make. We have given him two choices, and they are to take either the privatisation line or that which will be provided in the Government's Bill by the public sector. It is entirely up to him which course he chooses. Madam Speaker, the appropriate course is for this Assembly to decide which Bill it supports before Mr Moore moves to refer the matter to his committee for further discussion. By the look on Mrs Carnell's face, she seems to think that the Government should have been wedded to the pharmacy approach because it had been proposed at some earlier stage. Well, it has not been.
There is some discussion about the users. I will tell you now that if this legislation is passed by this Assembly there will be swift movement to deal with the problems of users, just as there has been in this last year when we increased the number of places from 80-odd to about 150. We will take the same approach with the properly regulated methadone program within the public sector which is designed not only to help the users but to help the community as well. We need to reduce the consumption of heroin out there in the community. We also need, Madam Speaker, to reduce the level of crime out there in the community. It seems that Mrs Carnell is more interested in privatisation and the profits of pharmacies, and Mr Moore is interested only in his own committee. I am interested in getting services to the community and to the people who need them.
MR HUMPHRIES (9.01): Madam Speaker, I am prepared to support Mr Moore's motion in the circumstances. It is extraordinary that we have seen such tremendous antagonism flow from the government benches, particularly from Mr Berry's place, towards the whole concept that has been put forward by Mrs Carnell and by the Liberal Party on a whole series of issues to do with health. We have seen angst on the part of the Government about the fact that the Liberal Party beat it to the punch on fluoride. We now have seen it pipped at the post on methadone. It will expect other - - -
Mr Berry: This is the answer; look.
MR HUMPHRIES: That is your press release, of course.
Mr Berry: It says, "Time to halt drug crimes".
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