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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 7 Hansard (26 June) . . Page.. 2336 ..

2

Mr Speaker

I would like to table the Community and Health Services (Amendment) Bill 1997. This Bill is for an Act to amend the Health Complaints Act 1993 and for related purposes.

The proposed amendments will broaden the functions of the Commissioner for Health Complaints. The Commissioner will in future be able to investigate and resolve complaints about a range of services provided specifically for aged people and for people with disabilities in the ACT.

Schedule 2 of the ACT Disability Services Act 1991 requires that programs be designed and administered so as to ensure appropriate avenues exist for people with disabilities to raise and have resolved any grievances about services. This independent mechanism through the Commissioner for Health Complaints is one element of a comprehensive complaints system.

In addition, the need for an independent mechanism to review complaints in this area has been highlighted in recent reviews and in other feedback from the community.

The proposed changes to the role of the Commissioner are widely supported in the community, and by people with disabilities, aged people and their advocates in particular.

An amendment is also included to enable the Commissioner to investigate complaints about the practices of health professionals preparing health status reports.

This amendment results from concerns about the limitation in the current Act on the Commissioner's ability to investigate complaints relating to workers compensation matters.

The original purpose of this clause was to prevent the health complaints mechanism from being used to undermine decisions and opinions obtained in situations where the opinion does not favour the injured worker.

The amendment proposed will enable the Commissioner to investigate complaints about the practices of health professionals preparing health status reports, whilst ensuring that the opinion or decision itself cannot be reviewed.

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