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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 12 Hansard (19 November) . . Page.. 3764 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

The issue of consultation is also very interesting. We are looking in the Social Policy Committee at issues of consultation and basic principles. What comes out always, and it came out in the conference I was at recently in Sydney - it was run by councils, which might be of interest to this council-style Liberal Government - is that one of the key concepts of efficient communication of information is the complaints mechanism. It is changing the situation so that you have complaints seen by the culture genuinely as information. What we are seeing in this place and in responses from this Government is that that is never seen as information. Complaints are always seen as an attack, and you do what you can to get rid of it, even if it means misquoting or misrepresenting or using lots of clever tactics. That is also totally unacceptable.

I was interested to see that it came out in the SPRAD review, too, which is the school review system. I was told consistently that it is 90 per cent satisfaction, and so we are meant to think everything is fine. But what came out very clearly in this conference is that it is the 10 per cent who are not satisfied who are interesting. It is that 10 per cent that you need to follow up because that is where your weaknesses are. If you have a real commitment to doing a good job in this area, you follow up those weaknesses. You do not intimidate people who approach you with information if they have the courage to do so. I have already covered that aspect of intimidation previously and I will not deal with it again.

Mrs Carnell: Without any evidence at all.

Mr De Domenico: No evidence at all. That is disgusting.

MS TUCKER: It is hard to provide evidence when people are asking you not to speak about what they are addressing because it is in confidence. The nature of the thing itself makes that difficult. It is very easy for you to totally disregard it, but that is fine. I have raised it because I know it is an issue. I will not be satisfied until I see clear processes for determining present unmet need and future need. Until I see strategies and plans which incorporate this information, we are likely to see crisis-driven policy in these areas, covered by grand rhetoric about how happy everyone is. Accountable government processes demand that this action be taken. I repeat that there may well be resource implications once this information is gathered, as then it will be clearer exactly what is not happening for people and, in this case under this Government, I suggest, the most vulnerable and disadvantaged in our community.

Mr Osborne: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. Under standing order 47, I would like to explain part of my speech. I said that I did not think mental health patients were the most disadvantaged. Ms Tucker said that I said they were not disadvantaged. I certainly do not think that, but I question whether they are the most disadvantaged members of the community. One could argue that unborn children are the most disadvantaged in the community, but we will not get into that, Mr Speaker. I thought I should explain it.

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