Page 451 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 24 February 1993
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what has happened in community nursing. In the September quarter 1991 there were 57,859 occasions of service in that particular area; this fell to 54,107 occasions of service in the September quarter 1992, with a similar figure recorded in the December quarter. It does not look like the money is going to domiciliary care.
How about we look at school dental services? In the September quarter 1991 there were 14,174 occasions; in the September quarter 1992 there were 11,290; in the December quarter 1992 there was another fall to 10,084 occasions of service. It is not going there. We can continue to go down this track. The figures for regional health services are: September quarter 1991, 44,823; September quarter 1992, 42,951; December quarter, 36,955. The story continues. The money is not going into health; the money is going into administration in health; the money is going into bad management. Mr Berry believes that this is the way you run a health service for the people of the ACT; he believes that this is the way you provide services. The actual health professionals in our system are doing a wonderful job. They need to be backed up by good management, sensible management and a properly resourced health service.
MS FOLLETT (Chief Minister and Treasurer) (3.46): Mr Deputy Speaker, I am pleased to be speaking on this matter of public importance today because the Government has a strong commitment to health services and to ensuring a responsible budget approach in the ACT. I would contrast this approach to Mr Humphries's period as Minister for Health when not only was there a $17m blow-out, $6m of which was unauthorised, but both the then Minister, Mr Humphries, and the then Treasurer, Mr Kaine, were unaware of it. Even Mrs Carnell has referred to that period as the bad old days. Her specific words were "the bad old days of the $17m blow-out"; I heard her say that on the radio. They were indeed the bad old days.
The health services in the ACT are undergoing an unprecedented degree of restructuring in order to be able to maintain quality services to the community and to maintain them in the face of successive cutbacks in Commonwealth funding. These cutbacks, of course, would be vastly exacerbated by the promises made by Dr Hewson not only to slash public health but to slash 5 per cent from the general revenue grant of this Territory and of all other States.
The health program funding from the budget in 1992-93 was $220.5m, representing some 20 per cent of total expenditures from the Consolidated Fund. It is indeed a sizeable part of our budget. The ACT inherited at self-government a health system which many speakers have referred to, which had expenditure levels which the Grants Commission estimated were 23 per cent higher than comparable State levels. Since self-government, the Commonwealth funding, which represents over half of the total revenues of the ACT, has been reduced in real terms at unprecedented rates, and the health budget has had to be substantially adjusted to cope with the ACT's reducing financial capacity whilst at the same time maintaining the services to the community.
All too often in debating budget issues the Opposition fails in any commitment to maintaining quality public services to the community. My Government delivered on the basic goal of pursuing a responsible budget approach, an approach which has been confirmed by comparisons of the ACT's recent financial performance with the States'. So it is not just me saying it; it is a matter which has been commented upon. It includes comparisons made by the Australian Bureau of Statistics and by the credit rating agencies - independent agencies.
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