Page 1110 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 30 March 2011
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prison, the hospital car park—everywhere you turn, there has been cost blow-out after cost blow-out. The Alexander Maconochie Centre has a long list of failures attached to it. Some of the faults that were identified have still not been rectified. There was an election stunt in 2008 involving the Alexander Maconochie Centre.
Then when we move into health we had the debacle of the cost of the hospital car park and the failure of the government to buy the Calvary hospital, because, of course, we did not need to. But we have not progressed on how to integrate Calvary hospital and manage Calvary hospital two or three years down the track. The government have failed.
Like their state and federal colleagues, the Labor machine churns out trademark, sloppy, ill-thought-out policy on the run without a thought to the bottom line. Spending is without a thought to the bottom line, which is why I have serious concerns about this so-called investment of $4 million; investment is what the minister calls it. Many people that I have spoken to in the childcare area are very concerned about the government’s proposal, which will only produce, by the minister’s own reckoning, about 10 new childcare places for west Belconnen. With a cost of $4 million, for every new childcare place there will be a government investment, for want of a better word, of $400,000—so the most expensive childcare places I can imagine.
Recently I had the privilege of visiting Baringa childcare centre in Belconnen, which has recently had an upgrade, for which they are very grateful, and I pay tribute to the minister and the department for the upgrade at Baringa. It is a picture. It is fabulous.
Ms Burch: Money well spent.
MRS DUNNE: And it is money well spent; at $375,000 for an additional 35 places, that is just slightly more than $10,000 a place.
Actually, Mr Smyth asked a question about the new childcare centre at west Belconnen and it is $400,000 for a new place. It is $40,000 for each of the places, but it is $400,000 for each new place. By contrast, Alkira got 35 new places for $375,000 or approximately slightly more than $10,000 a place.
Ms Burch: Baringa.
MRS DUNNE: Baringa; that is what I said.
Ms Burch: No, you said Alkira.
MRS DUNNE: Did I? I do apologise. I meant Baringa—a fabulous, really great refurbishment. The children, the workers and the management there are overjoyed, and I am sure the parents are as well. This is the sort of service that the people of Belconnen should be getting, but I do not think it is the sort of service that the people who send their children to Alkira and Gumnut, and their staff, are getting at the moment.
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