Page 93 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 12 February 2019
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
Canberra Hospital, had spent a considerable amount of time in the mental health part of accident and emergency.
His father reported to me and to other members how distressed he was because this young man was released into homelessness. He was in fact, in his father’s words, released to a tent and a sleeping bag in the bush behind the Belconnen Markets. It took some days for him to be contacted and for his father to be able to make contact with him. There was considerable concern about the fact that a person in those circumstances should be released from a health facility where he had been receiving treatment into homelessness. There is no doubt about it: the man was released into homelessness.
Mr Rattenbury might ask why I raise these issues. I raise them out of concern for this person in particular but also for the number of people we see who are discharged from the mental health environment into unsatisfactory circumstances. And, as Ms Lawder pointed out to me, being released to a homelessness organisation is effectively being released into homelessness. This is something that, as a community, we need to be working on a lot more diligently.
Mr Rattenbury has raised a whole lot of issues. These people are adults, they are entitled to be autonomous, et cetera. But, at the same time, as a community we have a duty of care to these people. It is not satisfactory that they are released from hospital to sleep rough behind the Belconnen Markets.
Mining—stop Adani rally
MR RATTENBURY (Kurrajong) (4.38): I had hoped to jump in after Ms Cody, because I thought that would be entirely appropriate in light of the two earlier speeches about the triathlon on the weekend, although today I was planning to speak about the stop Adani rally this morning.
The lawns of Parliament House have always been a powerful site for political protest. For decades, Australians have congregated outside the political centre of our country to demand justice from the government of the day on a host of issues. Certainly this morning was no different. Australians from all walks of life stood outside Parliament House and spoke with a unified voice, amplifying a simple and powerful message: the need to stop Adani. With Ms Le Couteur and seven of the federal Greens senators, I was lucky enough to be standing alongside them, adding my voice to the chorus.
With the effects of human-induced climate change already beginning to bear down upon us, protesting against complacency is more important than ever. Rising temperatures and extreme weather conditions are becoming much more frequent, and the dangerous impact of carbon emissions on our atmosphere is well understood. This summer, heatwaves have swept our country, with last month being the hottest ever recorded. The five warmest years of recorded history have been the last five.
This is why we need to make sure that politicians build our future on renewable energy, not on coal. The United Nations intergovernmental panel on climate change says we need to halve our carbon emissions by 2030 to avoid rising above two
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video