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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 6 Hansard (24 May) . . Page.. 1653 ..

MR HUMPHRIES: Those opposite may not realise that there are substantial emerging needs all the time in our health system and that what is true today about the break-up of the services being offered by our health system to its patients, its clients, will be untrue by next year and probably extremely untrue five years from now.

What the government has identified is the clear need to be able to fund changing needs in the health system. There needs to be a medium-term projection for the capacity to meet those changing needs in such a way that people do not front up to our hospitals, our health centres, our baby health clinics, or wherever it might be, and say, "I have a problem I want you to help me fix," and we have to say, "Sorry, we have not got a budget for that," or, "Our budget for this particular type of procedure has been exhausted." Nobody wants that kind of outcome in our heath system and nobody deserves it because a budgetary system cements in place services for particular kinds of operations or treatments.

What the government has asked me to do is put a sum of about $62 million into a fund which will be adapted. The purpose of the funds will grow to meet the needs of particular areas of our health system as those needs emerge. It is hard to project them all with great accuracy early on but it is possible to do this the further down the track you go. I think the community expects the government to have a flexible budget-a budget flexible enough to deal with those sorts of issues.

The idea inherent in the comments made by some members of the Assembly about this process is that somehow this is money which is actually just there for Mr Moore to spend at his discretion. That is not the case. It never has been the case and it never would be the case. It is clear that this money is to address health needs. In the next six to 12 months we could have a surge in the number of people coming forward requiring operations for cataracts, hip replacements, certain prosthesis or heart/lung conditions, whatever it might be. If that happens, we would want to have the procedure in place.

Members of the Assembly have said to us, "We don't like this idea of unallocated funds. It is a dreadful thing to discover in this budget that you have these unallocated funds." Can I remind members that these provisions actually occurred in the draft budget as well, and there was no comment about that in the draft budget that I can recall. I think Mr Wood was the chair of the committee that looked at that matter. Perhaps I have overlooked the report that he brought down. I assume that in his draft budget report Mr Wood made comment on the unallocated funds in health. I will go back and check-I must have overlooked that fact.

Do not blame us for the fact that you have not done your homework on the draft budget. The fund has been increased to identify and meet real needs in our health system. The fund has been increased to deal with greater need in our health system and to make sure people are not turned away from our health system. You people get upset because we are dealing with those problems.

I am proud that we have a balanced budget in the territory which addresses the real needs of the people of Canberra. It is about addressing and building up the social fabric of our community, and I am very proud to have done it in that way.

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