Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .
Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 3 Hansard (13 March) . . Page.. 1051 ..
MR STANHOPE
(continuing):by your federal Liberal colleagues, to Medicare and to meeting their responsibilities in relation to aged care, general practice and a universal health care system that supports and serves all the people of Australia.
Do not get up here and spray away after you sat on these benches for seven years. We have been here for a year. You sat here for seven years and you jump up now, after seven years on this bench. For seven years, you drove mental health funding from optimal funding, compared to other jurisdictional averages, to the lowest level of per capita funding in Australia. We inherited a system in which per capita funding for mental health in this territory is 18 per cent less than the next lowest jurisdiction in Australia.
We are seeking to address one of your legacies. When we came into government here, we found, having had in 1995-96 a position in which our funding for mental health was at the highest rank of funding jurisdictionally in Australia, a situation where we now fund mental health-or we did until we got here-at 18 per cent less than the next worst jurisdiction in Australia.
That is just one stark illustration of what you did to the health care system in the ACT. I do not know how you dare to sit there and point the finger at us, after a year, compared to your desperate treatment of health care responsibilities in this territory.
Debate these issues seriously. Debate them in the way Mr Corbell did. Mr Corbell raised a range of serious issues.
MR SPEAKER
: Order, everybody-order! Members of the opposition will maintain order. Mr Stanhope, if you direct your comments through the chair, they might be less provoked.MR STANHOPE
: I am happy to do that but I did not think I was being particularly provocative.MR SPEAKER
: Neither did I.MR STANHOPE
: I was going to conclude on that point Mr Speaker.MR STEFANIAK
(4.09): I don't profess to be a great expert on health, but I happened to do an auction for the AMA on Friday. I am delighted that they raised over $40,000 for the bushfire appeal. There is a bit more to come, because of the generous donation of an overseas trip by someone. I had a chance to talk to quite a few doctors there. I have also been visited by one recently. A member of Mr Smyth's office came to my office when a doctor visited me recently to discuss some of the problems facing GPs in the territory.It is interesting that the doctor who came to see me and the people I spoke to last Friday night all had one very big point in common and that was the real problems caused by medical professional indemnity insurance. It was explained to me that they can be sued up to about 27 years after the event. They can be sued not only for negligence, which one would expect might be quite reasonable, but also for accidents. According to these doctors, that more than anything else was driving people out from being GPs in droves.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .