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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 10 Hansard (6 December) . . Page.. 2718 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

The claim that we are about to lose all salaried doctors from our health centres is an extraordinary one, in the light of what those people opposite did. The raw thing about this motion is that it is being supported gleefully by the lot opposite, who slashed the number of such doctors in the ACT from 18 to nine in the course of their three years. The best we could ever hope to do - and I am not, Ms Tucker, saying that it is a good thing to do, please take note - is match your performance. There are only nine doctors left. The raw, unadulterated hypocrisy in this matter is clearly and utterly unbelievable.

Everyone in this place accepts that there are real problems in our health system. Those of us who are honest enough to admit it would not say that this is the product of any one government's actions. It is the product of a system that is in deep crisis across the whole of this country. But the minute someone actually gets in there and tries to do something about this problem, what happens? In this place, they get their heads kicked in. You people have no credibility whatsoever on this question. You are hypocrites. You are raw, unabashed hypocrites, and you should acknowledge it. Everyone in this place is happy to whinge and whine about the problems within the health centres, but who in this chamber is willing to grasp the nettle and actually try to put in place some meaningful reform of this system?

The difference between what Mr Connolly and Mr Berry presided over and what Mrs Carnell is now doing is that we are trying to give the doctors who are in the centres, or were in the centres, a stake in those centres to encourage them to stay and develop those health centres.

Mr Connolly: Yes, privatise.

MR HUMPHRIES: You people might not have been able to privatise them, but you are prepared to destroy them by attrition.

Mr Connolly: What nonsense!

MR HUMPHRIES: Where did the nine doctors go, Mr Connolly? Were they kidnapped by Martians? Did they defect to the Soviet bloc? Did they get into a submarine and go to China? Where did they go? You got rid of them. You pack of hypocrites opposite got rid of them, and you have the nerve to get up in this place and say, "Yes, yes, yes, we will support this motion of censure of the Health Minister". You people could not lie straight in bed.

It is disgraceful that this Assembly is censuring a Minister who is actually doing her job, who is attempting to put in place a sensible reform that would have generated significant savings for the people of Canberra, to put them into places where they are necessary and needed. We do not need salaried doctors in our health centres. We need other health services, ancillary health services. There are 450 GPs in this town, most of whom bulk-bill people on low incomes. There is not a problem about access to doctors. There is a problem about other ancillary services. We want to find money to keep those ancillary services going, and it is to the great disgrace and discredit of this Assembly that there are people here trying to stop Mrs Carnell doing that.

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