Page 1658 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 18 May 1994
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
We are developing a strategy to improve the financing of ACT Health - something that you conspicuously failed to do when you were in office, Mr Humphries, and when you were on the Board of Health, Mrs Carnell. This Government will go ahead with the task of improving ACT Health. Casemix will be a factor and a tool we will use, but it is not the magic wand.
Mental Health Services
MR MOORE: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to Mr Connolly as both Minister for Health and Attorney-General. The Minister will be aware that a person requiring mental health treatment is appearing in court yet again today on a number of charges, in spite of the Minister's assurance in March 1993 that facilities for treatment would be made available in a few months. That is just by way of background. What action is the Minister taking to ensure that yet another younger person who shows every sign of going down the same path and who desperately needs treatment of a permanent kind does not also end up being dealt with by the legal system?
MR CONNOLLY: Madam Speaker, one of the main thrusts behind the reform package on mental health that Mr Berry and I developed jointly when he was Health Minister and I was Attorney-General was to try to break this cycle where people get kicked around the criminal justice system when it would appear to an impartial observer - it certainly appears to many people in the criminal justice system - that they are in need of a mental health response.
The case Mr Moore is referring to may well be a case that received attention the other week on an ABC program by the name of Attitude. I noted that the strongest criticism that was made by the parents of that individual was their frustration at the inability of the medical profession to provide a diagnosis. We cannot as a government say that we think this is the treatment option and provide some form of compulsory mental health treatment because I as Attorney-General think or Mr Lamont as Community Services Minister thinks that would benefit that young person. You can only ensure that the medical profession sees that young person and that the medical profession makes judgments. There is clearly a sense of frustration, which was conveyed by the parents, that for many years they have been unable to get any clear diagnosis and any clear indication from the profession as to what should occur. One of the central points in the package before the Assembly, and one which, by and large, was supported in the recommendations of the committee that have been tabled is that there is that need to ensure that we divert people out, and that is what our legislative mechanism will provide.
Mr Moore asks what our treatment mechanism is. Do we have an adequate treatment mechanism? I can only provide the treatment mechanism, as the Minister for Health, when the medical profession provides a diagnosis and refers the person to that treatment mechanism. I cannot make judgments, and lawyers cannot make judgments, much as they would like to, and much as they publicly, in this case, have often suggested that there should be this treatment option for a person. The gateway for a treatment option, at the moment, is the order of a doctor. Under our legislation, the Mental Health Tribunal may have some say in directing treatment options, but it is certainly not for me as a politician
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .