Page 3100 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 15 September 1993
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This is said with the benefit of hindsight, and let me also put my own position on the record: I approved that variation in this Assembly with the same mistake. I am not attempting to say that this is being said with anything other than the benefit of hindsight and the benefit of Mr Todd's comments. We now have to be very careful how we deal with that, and that is part of what the Planning Committee is considering. I think Mr Kaine's comments were a little on the churlish side. The most important thing we can do is take the comments of Mr Todd, accepting the limitations of what he was able to do in his report within the timeframe, and see what we can learn from them and how we can benefit. With those few comments, Madam Speaker, I think the matter is not closed but continues.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Sitting suspended from 12.30 to 2.30 pm
QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE
Health Budget
MRS CARNELL: My question without notice is to the Minister for Health. Given that your Government's budget predicts that the number of aged people in Canberra will grow by 4 per cent, that the total population will grow by 1.7 per cent, and that the levels of private health insurance will continue to fall, resulting in significantly more people relying on our public hospital system, on what basis did you factor no increase in activity levels into the health budget?
MR BERRY: We factored in a figure of $259.4m for the health budget this year. This compares to an expenditure last year of $254.6m. What we also plan to do is continue to strengthen our public hospital system, which is quite different from what the Liberals had planned for us. So it was on the basis of our commitment to a stronger public hospital system.
Last year we treated something like 2,000 more people than were treated the year before - that represented an increase of around 5 per cent - and there was about a 9 per cent increase in outpatient occasions of service, which were significant increases. There was no evidence that the community was becoming any sicker, and it was clear to the Government that that was an appropriate figure. We have chosen that figure and, as I will say to you in the Estimates Committee this year, we hope to do - - -
Mrs Carnell: But you were wrong last year.
MR BERRY: I will give you the same answer. We will be treating about the same number as last year, and we hope to do a little better.
MRS CARNELL: I ask a supplementary question, Madam Speaker. Given that there are already 2,800 people on the hospital waiting list, if your predictions that there will be no extra admissions hold true, how many extra Canberrans will be waiting for surgery by the end of this financial year?
MR BERRY: That is a hypothetical question, Madam Speaker.
MADAM SPEAKER: It is out of order.
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