Page 143 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 15 February 2012
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She raved on at great length about the wonderful service that has been provided at the Canberra Hospital walk-in centre. This was not just one simple statement. She referred to health care where you need it and to two new nurse-led walk-in centres for Belconnen and Tuggeranong. She said that they were going to expand the health service. This is on Katy Gallagher’s website. There are 570 words about how they are expanding the service and that there were going to be two new centres.
We saw this on ACT Labor’s website—that they are going to expand the service. We saw it in the press release that was put out. We saw it all over the place. In every single one of Katy Gallagher’s statements to the media, in all her discussion on that day when she announced her new team, all of the talk was about two new centres and expanding the service.
There was not one single comment, not a single one, that they were actually going to close the one at the Canberra Hospital or that these two new centres were actually going to be half centres. They were not going to be like the one at TCH. They were just going to be half centres.
All of the media—and I have spoken to lots of people in the media—and certainly the community were under that impression. I said, “She has promised $10 million for this, but two new centres cost about $10 million each. They should cost $20 million. So where is the missing centre?” They all thought that there were going to be three walk-in centres as a result of this. They were misled—totally misled, Mr Speaker.
My understanding is that the media then went back to her and asked: “Is it your intention to close the walk-in centre at the Canberra Hospital? What is going on? Why did you not say that? Why did you not say that on 12 December?” Katy Gallagher’s response was, “No-one asked me.” She said, “No one asked me.”
She went out on 12 December trying to give the impression to the community that she was going to keep her promise from 2008, that there were two new centres. She raved on about the current centre and she omitted from all of those statements, from her press release, from the Labor press release, from what she said to the Canberra Times, to the ABC, to WIN news, to 2CC, to the FM stations the fact that her policy also includes her plan to close the current centre.
At best, you do not get two new centres. What you get is one new centre and one centre relocated from the Canberra Hospital to either Tuggeranong or Belconnen. The media then dug this to ground. They asked, “Is this true?” They spoke to Katy Gallagher. It turns out that it was true. Peter Jean in the Canberra Times found this out and said, “Govt could shut hospital’s walk-in centre.” The article stated:
Chief Minister and Health Minister Katy Gallagher wants to close the popular nurse-led walk-in clinic at The Canberra Hospital when two more centres open at Belconnen and Tuggeranong.
Ms Gallagher announced last week that a re-elected Labor Government would provide an additional $10 million over four years … to support the expansion of the walk-in clinic services.
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