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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 8 Hansard (25 August) . . Page.. 2435 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

The motion that was on the notice paper was drafted by me in ignorance of the fact that Mr Moore had agreed to add an additional two sites to the relocation study for the hospice. I read about that in this morning's paper, but that was after I had put my motion on the notice paper. Mr Moore's announcement changed the thrust of the motion to some extent, and that is the reason I have changed it.

The basis of the motion is that the two most significant groups within the community delivering care to the terminally ill - namely, the ACT Hospice and Palliative Care Society and the ACT Hospice - were concerned to see a genuine assessment of hospice sites more centrally located than the majority of those identified in the relocation study that was undertaken by Mr Moore's department.

Mr Moore, through his department, has instituted a study of possible sites for the relocation of the hospice. Some of those sites are in the vicinity of Calvary Hospital, one is on the shores of Lake Burley Griffin and the one nominated by the Hospice and Palliative Care Society is at Yarralumla Bay. The society are most concerned that the hospice should be in a central location, a location readily owned by the entire ACT population and a location adjacent to public transport routes. To them, they are significant features of any replacement site. The society and significant members of the Canberra community who have been touched by the work that the hospice and the palliative care team do believe that another consideration should also constitute part of the relocation study - namely, that it should be a site of outstanding amenity.

Many people who have been affected by the work of the hospice, who have relatives or friends who are terminally ill and wish to utilise the service or who have utilised the hospice currently on Acton would like to see the pre-eminent nature of the existing facility replicated in any hospice we develop as a result of our losing our tenure on Acton Peninsula.

I think it is important that we outline some of the history so that we can best understand the issue we are facing today and the reasons that we are in the situation we are in. I will not go into too much detail. It is late in the day and time is pressing. We have a world-class hospice on Acton Peninsula. That is a statement that is not contradicted by anybody in the ACT or, as I understand the situation, possibly anybody in the world. The ACT Hospice is regarded as almost best practice in the provision of hospice and palliative care for people who are dying. It is an institution that has the very highest reputation, an unsurpassed reputation. There is no doubt about that.

Part of that is due the nature of the hospice. It is freestanding. It is not associated with other acute or subacute health facilities. It is managed by the Little Company of Mary, which is without peer in the care of the terminally ill. It is staffed by expert palliative care sisters. It has a close association with the Hospice and Palliative Care Society and the volunteers and carers they bring to the care of the dying. It is also closely associated with the home-based palliative care team of the Department of Health and Community Care. It provides an overall general holistic regime of care for people who are, unfortunately, dying and need the specialist care that a hospice or specialist palliative care professionals across all the range of professions that deal with the needs of the

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