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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 7 Hansard (24 June) . . Page.. 2021 ..

MS REILLY (continuing):

That brings us to what is going to happen with the Jindalee Nursing Home. I notice that Mrs Carnell has put out a press release and she also had a dorothy dix question last week about how well Johnson Village Services were doing at Jindalee. They must have been laughing last year when they paid $250,000 for that nursing home. If they had been in Sydney, buying an equivalent property, they would have had to pay at least $1.6m. That is the going bed rate in that market. That is a fairly standard cost across Australia. But they got it for $250,000.

Then there was the $700,000 they were going to have to spend. I have not forgotten the $700,000, Mrs Carnell. I did ask you in the Estimates Committee what that had been spent on. It was really interesting to find out what happened. All I got was one folksy little note from Johnson Village Services, which is the copy that you sent me, that talked about some of the things they were doing and offering their services to you to help with things such as employment and training. But, obviously, from looking at the standards report, they have not been spending that $700,000 on bathrooms, because still the bathrooms are not up to scratch. This is nearly 12 months after they moved in, and they are still not meeting standards.

Mrs Carnell: Two.

MS REILLY: There are two standards that they did not meet. The Commonwealth Department had been extremely kind. When they made the visit in October, there were more than 10 standards that were not met. The Commonwealth decided not to publish at that time, which is usually an indication that they are not doing too well. I rang the Commonwealth and asked for a copy of the standards report, but I found that it was not being published - a good indication that things were not too hot. When you look at which standards they were not meeting, you find that they were not meeting health care standards - three out of nine standards were not met. They did not meet freedom of choice standards - one out of two was not met. They did not meet issues around privacy and dignity - three out of six were not met. That was six months after they moved in.

These are not issues that cost money. These are issues that say that there is a certain culture in the nursing home that means that people are looked after in terms of privacy, dignity and freedom of choice. But we still have the ones that are not being met at this time. I hope that they get to meet them very quickly. That $700,000 has been described as for painting and curtains. A hell of a lot of painting has to be done and an awful lot of curtains have to be put up to make $700,000. I would not have thought that was capital expenditure anyway. I would have thought that was recurrent - - -

MR SPEAKER: Order! The member's time has expired.

MS REILLY: May I have an extension?

MR SPEAKER: You can have your other 10 minutes, if you wish. You are entitled to it.

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