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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 10 Hansard (Wednesday, 25 August 2004) . . Page.. 4180 ..

$10 million Impulse hangar at the Canberra Airport and ask, “What do we get for this empty $10 million Impulse hangar at the Airport?”

We hear this government raving and ranting about the convention centre—a convention centre that they were not prepared to fund. They rave about it now. We look at legacy of those opposite. We look at the legacy of the Liberal Party and the $10 million deal paid to a now defunct airline. It went up in smoke. But the legacy is there. Every time we fly into Canberra Airport, we see the legacy of the Liberal Party support for business.

We see it too when we think about the FAI contract. We see it when we think about the Fujitsu contract. We think about it when we remember the illegalities around Bruce Stadium. We think about it when we look and recall the bungled hospital implosion. These are the things that we are aware of and that we do think about.

We also recall the appalling mess that the Liberal Party made of health. They have made much of health and they think they have traction on this issue. We ought to go back to 8 August 2001. An internal memo revealed that the Canberra Hospital bed and staffing crisis had reached breaking point, with management discussing activating its disaster plan. Hospital authorities considered calling in the Defence Force to deal with the crisis.

On 5 April 2001, Leah de Forest from the Canberra Times reported that “patients are being hooked up to monitors in storage rooms and being forced to spend nights on trolleys as Canberra Hospital is pushed to breaking point”. After the humbug, the hypocrisy and the carrying on that we have seen over these last couple of months, we see “patients are being kept in storage rooms”. As a result of the fine steps that we have taken to address these problems that we inherited, we have cant and ranting.

“Nursing shortages at the Canberra Hospital have forced the closure of 17 beds”, states the Canberra Times of 18 July 2001. And here they are standing up ranting and raving about there being not enough beds. I repeat: ‘“nursing shortages at the Canberra Hospital have forced the closure of 17 beds”, states the Canberra Times of July 2001.’ It goes on and it goes on. They stand here today and they pretend that they left this fantastic, pristine system or service for us.

We have achieved a lot over this last three years—achievements that I am particularly proud of. We have, for the first time as a government, put in place a range of long-term strategic planning that sets this city up for a fantastic future.

Mr Smyth: Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The Chief Minister is misleading the Assembly: he is saying that it is the first time a strategic plan has been put in. I hold up the 1996 strategic plan. The Chief Minister should withdraw the comment.

MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: There is no point of order.

MR STANHOPE: I am particularly proud of this government’s achievements. We have put in place a range of strategic plans of an order that have never been achieved before through the Canberra Plan, the spatial plan, the social plan and the economic white paper. We have in place a range of plans that stands this community in very good stead.

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