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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 2 Hansard (29 February) . . Page.. 450 ..

By Mrs (continuing):

The Government announced last year that it would not sell Kippax Health Centre. The centre mostly accommodates private practitioners and is underutilised. Every effort is being made to try and find additional tenants to make it viable to continue operating.

The public health services currently located in the building will continue to be provided to residents of Belconnen even though they may operate from different venues. In some instances space may be rented from the new owners to deliver services if this is considered appropriate.

Yours sincerely

Kate Carnell MLA

Minister for Health and Community Care

27 Feb 1996

MS FOLLETT (Leader of the Opposition) (10.32): Mr Speaker, I move:

That the resolution of the Assembly of 24 October 1995 which establishes the Select Committee on Competition Policy be amended by omitting "first sitting day in March 1996" from paragraph (3) and substituting "first sitting day in April 1996".

The motion proposes to amend the resolution of appointment of the Select Committee on Competition Policy to alter the reporting date for the committee. I will speak very briefly on it, because it is a straightforward request from the committee. Mr Speaker, the select committee has been very active in pursuing this reference on competition policy. We have advertised for submissions on the subject and have received some very high quality submissions. We have held three days of public hearings on the subject, and we need a little further time to conclude our deliberations and report to the Assembly. In particular, we were somewhat delayed in the public hearings by the Christmas-New Year break, which meant that all of our witnesses appeared somewhat later than we had originally planned. Nevertheless, Mr Speaker, the committee has been quite vigorous in its pursuit of the reference. I believe that the report which we will present to the Assembly will be both helpful and enlightening on the subject.

Mr Speaker, by delaying our reporting date for a month, which is our request, we will not in any way interfere with the Government's intention of getting the competition Bill through the Assembly by the required date, which is 1 July. It is quite categorically not the intention of the committee to delay the passage of that legislation, only to ensure that our report is well considered and covers the many issues in our reference which deserve to be covered. I commend the motion to the Assembly.

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