Page 2822 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 13 September 1994
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NURSES (AMENDMENT) BILL 1994
[COGNATE BILLS:
VETERINARY SURGEONS (AMENDMENT) BILL 1994
PHYSIOTHERAPISTS (AMENDMENT) BILL 1994]
Debate resumed from 16 June 1994, on motion by Mr Connolly:
That this Bill be agreed to in principle.
MR ACTING SPEAKER: Is it the wish of the Assembly to debate this order of the day concurrently with the Veterinary Surgeons (Amendment) Bill 1994 and the Physiotherapists (Amendment) Bill 1994? There being no objection, that course will be followed. I remind members that, in debating order of the day No. 1, they may also address their remarks to orders of the day Nos 2 and 3.
MRS CARNELL (Leader of the Opposition) (8.01): I will be very brief, as I think many of the comments that could be made about these three Bills have been made previously on other Bills in this series that have gone through this house; but I suppose that the thing that still needs to be said is that, although we totally support these Bills - and this is certainly no slight at all on the Government - the one thing that in Australia generally we are going to have to be aware of with the passage of these Bills through State parliaments is that we are going down the track of a lowest common denominator.
What currently is the situation, as I know Mr Connolly will be aware, is that, if people continue their registration in any one State, then they can be registered in any other State. New registration requirements cannot be placed upon those people. What that really means is that somebody who may have registered 20 years ago, who has not attended one extra piece of education and who has not read one journal in the intervening period is in a position of being able to register as a health practitioner in the ACT or, for that matter, in any State. I think it is something that is going to have to be addressed. I am sure that everybody in the health area believes that it should be addressed sooner rather than later, but it still has not been. It is unfortunate and it certainly is one of the downsides of mutual recognition. Apart from that, these Bills are well put together and well drafted, there have been appropriate consultations with the various people involved, and the Liberal Party will be supporting the Bills.
MR CONNOLLY (Attorney-General and Minister for Health) (8.03), in reply: As Mrs Carnell said, just about everything that could be said on these Bills has probably been said in a very short period. The issue about lowest common denominator that Mrs Carnell makes is a point that is well made. As one who attends a range of ministerial councils - the Chief Minister, of course, attends the COAG meetings - we often see the lowest common denominators, and often it tends to be conservative Premiers or conservative Ministers who get very upset at national uniform regulation.
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