Page 2823 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 13 September 1994
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Certainly, when we go down this path we need to avoid the experience of the United States, where certain jurisdictions set themselves up on very easy registration procedures. In the corporate sector, Delaware is notorious as the home of the dodgy corporation. "Delaware corporation" is a code for something a little shonky. There are certain universities that operate in certain States of the United States that provide you with a $200 PhD or a licence to practise medicine, law, or what-have-you, for an appropriate fee. We need to ensure that that does not occur in Australia. There is no indication that it will.
The issue of professionals doing their post-admission procedures - making sure, as you say, that they read the journals and do their continuing education - probably is best left to the professions themselves. The philosophy that has been prevailing in Australia in recent years is that government should be a little more deregulatory and leave professional standards up to the professions. It is a philosophy that this Labor Government is not a wild enthusiastic flag-waver on. To some extent, we would be more inclined to be a little bit interventionist in the public interest; but the view around Australia was very strongly that we should be a little less so, and we were prepared to go along with the flow. The reservations that the Leader of the Opposition has are reservations that we tend to share, but at this point in Australia's history the pattern is to move it down.
The other thing that is perhaps worth noting is the slightly incongruous situation - it has always struck me as such - that the veterinary surgeons are, in fact, administered by the Department of Health rather than the department of ACT administration that deals with dogs, cats, animals and such like. I have asked my Health bureaucrats on a number of occasions why it is that I administer vets. I am yet to receive an entirely satisfactory answer. Anyway, they are part of the package as well.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Bill agreed to in principle.
Leave granted to dispense with the detail stage.
Bill agreed to.
VETERINARY SURGEONS (AMENDMENT) BILL 1994
Debate resumed from 16 June 1994, on motion by Mr Connolly:
That this Bill be agreed to in principle.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Bill agreed to in principle.
Leave granted to dispense with the detail stage.
Bill agreed to.
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