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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 1 Hansard (13 December) . . Page.. 210 ..
MR STEFANIAK (continuing):
Another comment:
In my opinion, there has been an excellent delivery of high quality service in all areas, i.e., personal comfort, accommodation, counselling, etc. There is a total team effort to coordinate all levels of support, and it becomes evident that the staff constantly seek to improve the quality and delivery of the service.
Another comment:
All the support and help was great. It has provided me with a useful stepping stone towards my future, and it has given me good access to services (i.e., housing, Centrelink, etc.) No improvement necessary.
A final comment from this series:
Like a family. All okay perfect.
You have a situation where there have been good comments like the ones that I have just quoted. Even the evaluation states that the people who provide the service received very favourable comments. There were some concerns which were largely negated by the service itself. I suppose, given the nature of services such as this, there is to an extent perhaps tension between the people running MAACS and some of the people in the women's services, and I think that is something that is unfortunate. I think it would be very sensible if the committee were in fact to assess this.
One thing that has come out of both my reading of the evaluation and talking to the people at MAACS is that this is an area of unmet need and there is certainly room for maybe one or two more services that accommodate the needs of men, and especially men with children. I would think that part of the committee's deliberations would be to look at whether a similar or same service elsewhere in Canberra could be established.
Tenders closed last week. I would not attempt to pre-judge what the committee would do, but at the end of the day it may well be that the service provided by MAACS is something that should well stay. On all the evidence that has been given to me and from my own observations-and I think several other members here who have looked at this matter would probably concur-there is a strong case for that service to continue. There may well be a very strong case too for the tender to ultimately be extended to include another service because there is a need for additional services of this type. So indeed everyone may well be able to end up a winner as a result of the committee's deliberations.
Finally, Mr Speaker, the concerns that I have in respect of the evaluation are further highlighted by the comments by MAACS which deal step by step with what the evaluation actually says. Certainly I am concerned about the differences in respect of whether things happened or not. I think this should be properly looked at by a committee.
I will conclude by quoting from a letter written by a young girl called Emily. Mr Corbell probably has a copy of this letter, as I think Mr Stanhope does. The letter reads:
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