Page 2653 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 25 August 1993
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MR HUMPHRIES: Thank you, Madam Speaker. The Minister did not address any of the other important issues which have been raised. This Minister cannot be proud of having 3,000 people on the public hospital waiting list. He cannot pretend for one instant that that list is not a matter of serious concern and should not be a very important focus for new initiatives in the health budget, but the Minister does not intend to deal with that. The Minister has no intention of dealing with that problem because he thinks he can wear the flak on those hospital waiting lists better than he can wear the flak from those parts of his party and his supporter base which have called for the creation of this particular facility. That, Madam Speaker, is where I believe we can draw the conclusion that this Government has elevated dogma above commonsense. There simply is not a good case for saying that our most pressing need at this time in the ACT's history is the creation of a new abortion service.
Madam Speaker, the point has been lost over here on my right. There is no question that women will continue to be able to get abortions in this Territory or outside it irrespective of whether this service goes ahead. No woman is going to say, "I cannot get an abortion because this facility is not being created by Wayne Berry". The fact of life is that here we are making a value judgment about the requirement of the Government to back up its rhetoric by funding from public money a service which it believes ought to be there and not in Sydney or Melbourne. Madam Speaker, that is a value judgment; it is not a judgment based on the most appropriate use of value for health dollars. In fact it flies in the face of any sensible assessment of the most important need for that health dollar.
The Minister referred to abortions occurring in the ACT public hospital system while I was Minister for Health. The argument that he put runs as follows: If it was happening in my health system I must have wanted it to happen. This is interesting logic. It follows from that logic that since there was a $7m blow-out while Mr Berry was Minister for Health he must have wanted it to happen. Madam Speaker, that argument cuts both ways. If I was a hypocrite in not stopping abortions while I was Minister, then Mr Berry is equally a hypocrite for not removing the restrictions on abortions which existed then and exist today in public hospitals. Because of the reasons for those restrictions he is now moving to create an abortion facility outside the ACT public hospital system. That is the reason he wants to do that.
Mr Berry: I am negotiating the contracts, Gary; you did not.
MR HUMPHRIES: The VMO contracts reference is a nice diversion, Mr Berry, but it does not address the fact that you did nothing about the capacity of doctors in the public hospital system to refuse people abortions. You, Mr Berry, are as much a hypocrite as I am, if you want to level that charge.
Madam Speaker, the debate about the Bill we passed last year, the Termination of Pregnancy (Repeal) Bill, and an ACT abortion clinic has divided and embittered this community. Whether Mr Berry likes to admit it or not, there are many people in this community who are deeply upset about this Government's decisions, both then and now. The reason they are upset is that they realise - I hope that Mr Moore and Ms Szuty realise this - that this Government has not underpinned any of its changes in this area with a mandate. Before the 1992 ACT
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