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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 10 Hansard (Tuesday, 24 August 2004) . . Page.. 3999 ..

People have been looking at entering the market but their efforts have been stymied by the government. The clear message from the community, from the people actually out there at the coalface trying to provide services, is that we need to approve every current application and every one that is vaguely being thought about. Even if we do that we will not meet the demand, especially if you use the figure that was put to us by Sir Leslie Moreshead Homes that there are 700 people in need of this assistance.

The committee’s report contains a range of recommendations. The committee has not opted to pick winners and say that the government should do this or that in preference to something else. In fact, essentially the committee says that the government needs to do everything that it is currently doing and it needs to do it quicker. Recommendation 1 states:

In recognition of the clear evidence from across the community that there are insufficient residential aged care places, the Committee recommends that the Government expedite the planning process for all sites currently under consideration.

Mr Speaker, the committee means all sites. That is a challenge to this government. Because what is proposed does not quite fit their view of the world, in many cases the government has been thwarting the process by applying the guidelines relating to the siting of aged care accommodation.

Ms Dundas rightly said that the clear evidence before the committee was that if we apply the guidelines in their strictest form it would be absolutely impossible to find a suitable block of land in the ACT on which to build any aged care accommodation. Just think of it: the guidelines say that aged care accommodation must be near to shops and medical centres and main roads; and not only must they be quiet but there must be no noise. That is a contradiction. If you are going to be near a main road so that you can have access to public transport and near shops so you can have access to facilities within easy walking distance, you cannot meet the other criterion that it has to be quiet. The criteria are set one against the other in a way that makes it absolutely impossible to meet the guidelines.

As a result, the government selectively uses the guidelines to rule some things out while the same guidelines do not apply to their pet projects. The guidelines do not apply to section 87 Belconnen. Section 87 fails most of the guidelines. In addition to that, the Calvary project, which has been championed by many in this place, does not meet the guidelines. What you have is people exercising discretion to rule out one thing because it is not flavour of the month and ruling in others because the government wants them.

There has to be an end to this. There has to be rationality in planning for aged care accommodation because the figures speak for themselves. The figures indicate that the ageing of the ACT population is ongoing. In our lifetime and in the lifetime of most of our children we will see an increased ageing of the population and planning for this must be addressed. We will also see a consistent change in household structures, with an increasing number of people living in single-person households, and this will have a big impact on our planning.

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