Page 1628 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 1 April 2009
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looking at this issue legislatively and through the committee process and through the GP task force. So we will all approach the issue in a different manner and, I think, from different angles, which all need to be examined.
As I have noted, the committee very much gives people, in particular the community, a chance to input on the issue. I think, seeing that we actually have two closures and other issues on GP access, it is important that we provide that. It is important also that we have a task force, such as a GP task force, which will engage organisations such as the Division of General Practice; so you are involving professional organisations plus government in looking at that issue.
With the legislative response, we do need to be looking at that because we have to look at ways through legislation by which we can provide patients at these practices appropriate notice. I also think it does put somewhat organisations such as Primary Health Care on notice as well because they then know that they cannot do what they did with Kippax practice and get away with that. I think it is important that we look at that also.
Again, thank you, Ms Porter, for bringing this motion to the Assembly. We will be supporting it.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (11.12): The plight of my constituents in Belconnen, especially those in west Belconnen, and their access to primary healthcare services is an extraordinarily important one. I thank Ms Porter for the opportunity to address those issues.
There has been much said by Mr Hanson and Mr Doszpot about the needs, in general terms, of people in the ACT in relation to access to primary healthcare services but I think that we really need to drill down substantially into what is happening and what is not happening to the people of Belconnen in general and west Belconnen in particular. I think we need to take the opportunity to look at the failings of the Stanhope government over a number of years in addressing the needs in that area and to dwell on the extraordinary achievements of individual members of the community in trying to make things better for the people of west Belconnen.
In doing that, I think that what we see here is a motion of lost opportunities. Ms Porter, in her attempt to be relevant to the people of west Belconnen, whom she has substantially let down on these matters, is trying to wave the flag and show that she is interested. But let us look at the record. Let us look at what has happened.
West Belconnen has lost yet more doctors. They have been moved, without consultation and essentially against the will of the doctors themselves, to other places. At the same time, Ms Porter and I have attended meetings in and out for the last four or five years, in various capacities, in relation to the West Belconnen Health Cooperative, which is still yet to see the light of day. Ms Porter and her entourage have been pretty good at attending meetings and saying the right things in relation to this but, when it came to the crunch, there was not support from Ms Porter.
The West Belconnen Health Cooperative is an extraordinary example of what can be done by members of the community who put their minds to it. This is a grassroots
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