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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 8 Hansard (20 August) . . Page.. 2948 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

through the recovery centre to ensure that the needs of the people directly affected are monitored constantly. They are monitored daily.

As Mr Corbell said, the processes and procedures we put in place here are now being studied by disaster organisations from around Australia because of the best practice model which we have created. What we have created, and we are not just saying this boastfully, is now regarded around Australia and by Emergency Management Australia as the benchmark, as best practice in disaster relief and recovery.

We have done it through the systems we put in place-the Bushfire Recovery Taskforce and the community and expert reference group, backed up by an exemplary recovery centre. We case manage all of those directly affected by the fire. Every person directly affected who wishes has a case manager. It is best practice. We monitor daily the needs of people and we have responded directly and explicitly to every need-to the point, for instance, where we have engaged and have available full time three counsellors at the recovery centre. I am advised by my officers that there is no waiting time for counselling services. Requests for an appointment to see a counsellor are met immediately. I am advised today there is no wait. We respond on the day of the request to a request for counselling. Those are the systems that we have put in place and that we are committed to continuing.

I am advised that over 200 individuals have sought and received and many continue to receive counselling since we established that service at the recovery centre. Much of it is outsourced. A whole range of providers from throughout the community have provided invaluable support and continue to do so in relation to the full range of issues that people are dealing with in that regard. We are counselling people to deal with all those issues around stress, anxiety and depression, and the relationship pressures and strains that have been created by them. Of those 200 individual clients, 10 per cent continue to receive ongoing care and support.

The motion calls on the government to outline to the Assembly by the close of business tomorrow its assessment of the future needs of those affected by the bushfires in regard to counselling and other services. I am more than happy to ask the bushfire task force to provide members of the Assembly with the details of the programs we have in place and our determination to keep the recovery centre open until at least March next year for monitoring. (Extension of time granted.)

The Bushfire Recovery Taskforce will be continuing, but will be wound back. The work that the Bushfire Recovery Taskforce is currently doing and has done in the most exemplary way has begun to wind back. We do not expect the task force to be utilised as fully or to have the role that it currently has beyond perhaps September or October this year. We are taking account of that by putting in place other mechanisms.

We have changed the nature of the secretariat supporting the task force because of the lessening amount of work. There have been some changes in personnel in relation to the community and expert reference group, but we recognise the need for an ongoing reference group to provide input from all aspects of the community to the task force and to the government.

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