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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 06 Hansard (Thursday, 24 June 2004) . . Page.. 2607 ..

about. $93 per head of population is not the $117 per head that Mr Corbell claims they’ve extended mental health funding by. What they did, Mr Speaker, was not put in almost double the money. What they did was simply shift the overheads out of the department into the mental health figure.

From another question on notice, we learn that from 2002-03 the cost of the mental health policy unit was included. The overhead component of the cost of mental health is also impacted on by the factors listed above. They then moved the restructure of financial reporting and met the inclusion of employee provisions. The cost of overheads recorded for mental health increased by $700,000 approximately. The mental health policy unit was incorporated.

So this is existing money. They haven’t doubled anything, Mr Speaker; yet the minister has come into this place on numerous occasions, as listed, and made the claim that they doubled the money. Going from $83 to $117 per head is not doubling it. When you add approximately $10 that takes it to $93, an eighth. That’s not doubling it. And when you look at it overall, it’s the old sleight of hand of shifting existing overheads and existing payments out of one part of the department into another part of the department, and that’s not doubling it. This is all misleading.

The minister knew this because his question time brief tells us so. It is the detail that was given to the minister in February before any of these numbers were played out either in the Assembly or out in the public. Mr Speaker, this is a minister who is prepared to mislead the Assembly quite without remorse. He is not fit to hold office.

MR STANHOPE (Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Minister for Environment and Minister for Community Affairs) (10.51): That is it, is it? That is the case? That is the case for asking one of the best ministers that the ACT has had to resign? That is the case, is it: an argument around where the forensic mental health facility should go; a contest about whether or not the forensic mental health facility might be at the hospital or at the prison, a decision or a position that hasn’t yet been finally resolved; a discussion and an argument about the number of psychiatric nurses, how they might be funded and where some might come from or whether or not they exist? That is the argument in relation to both those things, if I can understand the argument.

That occurred two years ago. This is a matter of such pressing moment, this is a matter of such concern to the opposition that a minister should resign his position, that he should leave the job, on the basis of questions that were asked in estimates—what?—18 months ago or earlier this year or six months ago. Did you notice the date on which these arguments occurred? Last year; in estimates 18 months ago or last year or earlier this year.

The opposition have had already this week 12 questions in question time. Here we have this matter, this dramatic matter of moment, that the opposition charges in here today at 10.30 and lays on the table, without notice, a no-confidence motion in relation to issues, in some instances, over a year old and in relation to which they didn’t even feel the need to ask questions in question time this week. That’s how pressing these matters are; that’s how urgent these issues are; that is how dramatic the case against the minister is that he should resign his portfolios that they did not ask a single question on a single one of

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