Page 3706 - Week 12 - Thursday, 22 November 2007
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for all community service providers, and that housing policies are available on the web. It does not appear that the ACT government is taking any steps to solve this problem. What happened to the community engagement unit and the social plan?
I note and appreciate the 12 per cent budget increase, but ACTCOSS has pointed out that as the community sector is the main provider of these services, we need increased funding for that sector. A useful medium-term goal of 30 per cent of mental health funding going to the community sector, as is the case in New Zealand, should be adopted.
Finally, I believe that the committee consulted widely and did much investigation, but did all that it learnt end up in that report or did the government have any say about its content? I know committee members were deeply interested and concerned but the committee does have a government majority.
MRS BURKE (Molonglo) (11.25): Mr Speaker, I have spoken previously in the debate so I seek leave to speak again.
Leave granted.
MRS BURKE: I will be brief. I wanted to have an opportunity to respond to and thank the government for the work they have put into their response to the recommendations that have been made. Overall, it is a positive move. The government’s response certainly has been welcomed by the committee. I will go through the response to the recommendations and make a couple of comments on each aspect. The government’s response states:
The report identifies that access to and maintenance of suitable accommodation and mental health support services are interrelated for people with mental illness. The stability of one can directly determine a person’s ability to access and manage the other.
Of course, this is a key and crucial area for people with mental health problems. It is also centred around appropriate support for those people. Once the accommodation side is fixed, it is important to make sure that approporiate and strong support is available to those people. Sometimes, that is where we can, as a community, do much better. We have moved away from the days of institutions, but in the wake of all of that, it has left some people in our community very vulnerable because we do not provide them with the level of support they need.
I note that the government disagreed with there being less provision of mental health services, but I think what the committee was trying to say there centred around services. The key word was “services” and that is what we were emphasising. When the committee visited Victoria, we saw some outstanding programs in operation. I think we can learn some things from those programs and transport them back to the ACT. Again, we talk about the service side of it being centred around that, and the need for appropriate and direct targeting of funding to meet the needs of the community. It is not just about money; it is about how we use that money.
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