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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 6 Hansard (1 September) . . Page.. 1722 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

not go far enough. I know that is a valid point of view. There is always a question of balance, as we have all talked about tonight - how far can you go within the parameters that are set? The parameters are not always budgetary parameters. There are a series of other parameters that apply to us as well - for example, how is the Assembly going to react to what we propose; how is the community going to react to what is proposed; how are workers going to react to what is proposed? These are all very important issues that need to be taken into account. Apart from that, I think Ms Tucker's speech raised a range of philosophical arguments that it is important to have put, but to respond to them now in this debate it would be very difficult to do them justice. I am sure that we will have those debates time and again and will look at them with more care.

However, I will take this opportunity to respond to a couple of things that Mr Wood raised when I ran out of time. Mr Wood mentioned respite care. We are trying to increase the provision of respite care. One example of that is using the Fisher COOOL house as a temporary measure for respite care while the residents move into the other house. Members will be pleased to hear that we are having some success in providing residential accommodation in the COOOL house in Fisher. Certainly, a number of people have moved in. We are in negotiations to bring a fourth person into that house, hopefully in the next couple of weeks. There have been some exchanges. You might be aware that one of the people who were in Macquarie has moved into Fisher. A swap took place as it suited both people. Some of the difficulties that we have encountered with COOOL are being resolved - very successfully I believe - by Community Care. I congratulate those who have been involved in that work. It has been particularly difficult and there have been a huge number of problems.

Mr Wood also raised the issue of drugs and alcohol and asked whether we provide an appropriate amount of care. There is certainly room for improvement, Mr Wood; there is no question about that. I do not deny that but, at the same time, there is a point at which we have to say, "Are people making their choices to use the services that are available, or are they making other choices?". There are times when people choose not to use the services that are available or, having tried the services three or four times, particularly people with an addiction, they just cannot bring themselves to go back and try yet again.

I know some people who have tried to give up smoking 16 and 17 times and when they say, "I am going to try again" everybody thinks, "Wow, that is terrific. This is somebody who really is working very hard to deal with that addiction". When somebody has been through a drug and alcohol facility for either heroin or alcohol and they go back in to try for the third or fourth time, we have a very different attitude for some reason, yet they are wrestling with the same issue. I admire people who go back and try yet again, because it must be incredibly debilitating to say, "I gave up for six months and I managed but now I have fallen again" - often that is the way people look at it - "and I am back to try again". But some people choose not to try for the sixth or seventh time. I believe there is no way we can force them. All we can do is make sure that the services are available when they want to be there, and we are working to achieve that.

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