Page 1644 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 18 May 1994
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Mr Berry: What do you want to happen? Do you want them to get the sack or something?
MR DE DOMENICO: No. Mr Berry does not understand, as usual. I did not say that at all. It went on to say - listen - that perhaps the way to address this imbalance is to allow private doctors to rent space in the Tuggeranong facility, that $3m facility. There is nothing wrong with that. This publicly paid for $3m facility - and I agree with Mr Connolly that it provides more than GPs; that it provides all sorts of social care services - is underutilised. Why is it underutilised?
Why did the private sector decide to build another facility two blocks down the road? They did so because at the time of Mr Berry's stewardship they were not allowed to rent facilities in the Tuggeranong building because of some ideological bent that the former Minister had. That is fine. The former Minister is entitled to have that ideological bent. We might not necessarily agree with it, but if that is the way he wanted to run the health system it was up to him. We are now saying that Mr Connolly takes another view of the way things should be run. Who can ever forget the public disagreement - let us be generous - between Mr Berry and Mr Connolly on our television sets. There was a disagreement. That is fine. That is for Mr Connolly and Mr Berry to resolve in caucus or wherever they resolve things.
What we are saying through this motion, though, is that we welcome the Government's apparently new stance on the way it treats health in the ACT. The way it is doing that, quite correctly, through Mr Connolly is by achieving balance. There is a role, and a very important role, in terms of social justice and all sorts of other things, for the public health system. All the people involved in the delivery of public health services - the nurses, the doctors and the people behind them - are doing a wonderful job. No-one from this side of the house has ever denied that. But there are obvious deficiencies in the way the public health system in the ACT is administered. Mrs Carnell spoke at length about the figures. Just to put you right, Mr Connolly - he is not here, unfortunately - that is what the press release yesterday said.
Mr Connolly also talked about Port Macquarie a lot. It was on his lips a lot. I am suggesting to Mr Connolly that 300 cardiac patients are sent from the ACT to New South Wales each year. That may be a perceived need, Mr Connolly. I am also glad to say that Mr Connolly intimated that, if a community based not-for-profit organisation should wish to build another private not-for-profit facility, it would be welcomed with open arms. That is a refreshing point of view, as far as we are concerned. They would not have been welcomed with such open arms under Mr Berry's stewardship. Once again, we welcome Mr Connolly's change of attitude and the way he is administering the Health Department and the provision of health services in the ACT.
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