Page 2616 - Week 08 - Thursday, 14 August 2014
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comments from Mr Wall, and I thank him for the observation that I have managed to continue in the Corrective Services portfolio. I must say that I am very pleased to continue as the Minister for Corrective Services. It is a fascinating portfolio and one that is very important in ensuring the safety of our community, making efforts to improve the lives of people who end up in the corrections systems and working with them to do our best to maximise the chance of them never coming back to us, which is something that I think is critically important in this role.
In his remarks, Mr Wall sought to build a narrative that suggested perhaps one of conspiracy around a lack of desire to provide information about what the government is spending in the budget. Hopefully, in the remarks I have just made, I have dispelled that myth, but I would like to assure members that there is no such lack of desire on the part of the government; the government has been completely up-front about the money that it is spending on corrections. It is all actually in the budget, but because I like to be a helpful minister, I have brought down a copy of the budget press release, which was issued on the day of the budget. It spells it out very clearly:
The ACT Budget provides recurrent and capital funding of $98.5 million over four years to increase bed numbers, and to improve the facilities through better use of space.
Mr Wall, in his remarks, suggested “You don’t want us to find out.” The bottom line is that it is all in the budget papers. Because of the fact that Mr Wall feels that that is not a transparent way of doing it, to make it simpler for him, because I do seek to be helpful, I am now going to table a copy of the press release that was issued on the budget day. I have highlighted, in a pink highlighter, for Mr Wall’s benefit, the details where they are fully spelt out in that publicly available press release—just to make it a little bit simpler. I table the following paper:
Budget 2014-2015—Investing in Community Safety—ACT Government media release.
If there are any further questions which are not provided by the budget papers or by the questions that were asked in estimates, I am more than happy to arrange a further briefing for Mr Wall in which the government can again outline the details of the money that is being spent, identify the page numbers in the budget papers and deal with any further questions that he may wish to ask.
Mr Wall then made some rather derogatory comments about the needle and syringe program and the agenda of the government in delivering that. He asked, “Who thinks this is a good idea?” I did check that. Some of the people who have made comments in support of it are organisations such as ATODA and the Public Health Association of Australia, through its local spokesperson, Michael Moore. I believe the AMA have also indicated support; in fact, I recall the AMA indicating their support for it. The AMA had an article in the Canberra Times during the period in which government was being negotiated, urging parties to continue efforts to implement a needle and syringe program.
It is far from condoning drug taking, as Mr Wall sought to suggest. The NSP does no such thing. The NSP is a recognised public health initiative that seeks to address the issue of bloodborne viruses. It is a measure that has been implemented in other
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