Page 3489 - Week 13 - Thursday, 26 November 1992
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Mr De Domenico: Perhaps I could finish. I am finding it very difficult to hear what Mrs Carnell has to say, because of interjections and private conversations occurring between members from both sides of this chamber, in particular Mr Moore, the repository of all knowledge on this side, Mr Berry and other members of the Assembly as well, Madam Speaker. I suggest that Mrs Carnell be heard in silence. Mr Moore has an opportunity of saying whatever he wants to say later on.
MADAM SPEAKER: Members may like to study standing orders 39 and 61 while Mrs Carnell continues.
MRS CARNELL: The committee also says that legal recognition should be given to partners in non-traditional domestic relationships. That is recommendation 5.3. I would certainly say that the issue of homosexual marriage would make for a very interesting debate in this house; but, quite frankly, I think the working party must have been straying from its main task, and that was the issue of AIDS prevention.
There is also a lot of debate currently raging over recommendation 5.2 for a consistent age of consent for both heterosexual and homosexual activity. We all know that if the ACT Labor Party rank and file members get their way the age of consent will be 13. Again, in making this recommendation it is quite clear that the working party must have been straying from its main task, and that should have been AIDS prevention. Whatever the merits of lowering the age of homosexual consent may be, I do not think that one of them happens to be AIDS prevention.
Another of the recommendations of this much vaunted working party is that there should be needle and syringe vending machines. This is going much too far - even I believe that - because there must be some level of personal supervision for interchange when needles are distributed. The approach to this very important issue should not be one of total abandon. I would have thought that Ms Szuty would have been very pleased, too, that one of the recommendations is along the lines of her Bill, and I am sure that the Government will totally support that. (Extension of time granted) Therefore, it is clearly the case that at least some of the recommendations in this report are flawed. It makes me wonder what the Australian Health Ministers were doing when they endorsed this report, or whether they endorsed this report at all. Since some of these recommendations may be able to be taken with a grain of salt, why is it the case that we must uncritically accept others such as those related to coded notification?
Madam Speaker, these regulatory amendments will legitimise practices which may not be in the interests of public health. In bringing the amendments, the Government has relied on the platitudes which have often been seen to dominate AIDS policy. New evidence is coming forth all the time - evidence which must encourage the Government to modernise its approach. This evidence in particular concerns a group of people who are not connected with the gay community and who previously have been neglected by anti-AIDS campaigners - bisexual men. The Labor Government has been totally concerned with the human rights of those affected by HIV, to the exclusion of women and children.
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