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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 10 Hansard (6 December) . . Page.. 2737 ..

MR STEFANIAK (continuing):

As well - as Ms McRae may well know - I have had a number of consultations with parents of special education students. They now meet on a regular basis. They had their first meeting a couple of weeks ago, for about half a day, with departmental officials, to ensure that this whole area is managed as best as it possibly can be; that is, the needs of the children in our mainstream schools and also the needs of the children in special education schools.

MS McRAE: I have a supplementary question, Mr Speaker. Mr Stefaniak, I am asking you this question specifically because the changes to the summer programs were done so quickly and without consultation. I understand that you are talking about the special education programs for 1997 and later. When are you going to announce the plans that you have for special education, particularly for next year?

MR STEFANIAK: As I indicated, the review is commencing this year. This proposal will be finalised early next year so that the Government then will be able to look at its findings and work out its response and anything that needs to be done further in relation to that. However, we have already had four additional places in the integration program. I have ensured that I have regular meetings with concerned parents. There are regular meetings between special education parents and the department. Those steps are already in place.

MR STEFANIAK: Might I, at this stage, table, for Mr Moore's benefit, a list of college unit and course offerings for semester one, 1995. This will show very clearly the fairly small number of classes which consist of more than one unit.

MR CONNOLLY: My question is directed to the Chief Minister, not the Minister for Education and Training. It is not about taking Bill out of his misery. Chief Minister, will you advise the Assembly of, firstly, the total cost of the redundancy packages for the community medical practitioners and, secondly, the global cost of the superannuation payout for the community medical practitioners, so that this Assembly can know how much it cost to ensure that there were no doctors in a health centre?

MRS CARNELL: Thank you very much. The total payment will be $445,000. This does not include existing - - -

Ms McRae: Each doctor?

MRS CARNELL: No, altogether; total, not each. This does not include existing entitlements for accumulating benefits such as annual leave and long service leave, which, of course, are existing benefits. They are things that had to be paid anyway and are part of our ongoing budgeting within Health; so, $445,000 is the answer, Mr Connolly. Interestingly, with the ASO support staff, no redundancy offers have had to be made. We have managed to redeploy all of those support staff to other parts of Health.

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