Page 2905 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 16 October 2007
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We have opened 147 beds since coming to government. It is interesting that in any discussion around competence, particularly economic competence and credibility, just to go to three initiatives within the space of one week, the shadow Treasurer proposes to take us straight into deficit in his first year in government. They would spend $54 million to provide an additional 100 acute care beds. They would abolish the utilities tax, which is $16.5 million on top of the $22 million that the Liberal Party has previously agreed to forgo in relation to the fire levy. That is a $91 million hit directly on the bottom line in policies expressed by the Leader of the Opposition, the shadow Minister for Health and the shadow Treasurer.
Mr Mulcahy: You are misrepresenting the facts.
MR STANHOPE: I am not misrepresenting anybody. One hundred acute care beds cost $54 million. One hundred acute care beds require in the order of 200 nurses to staff. Five days after his leader announced this $54 million budget commitment, the shadow Treasurer committed formally to introducing legislation, in a week obviously of stunts, to repeal the utilities tax. That is $16.5 million a year. I do not know why the shadow Treasurer did not at the same time say that they would introduce in another stunt legislation to abolish the fire levy consistent with the policy.
Mr Mulcahy: It is not our policy.
MR STANHOPE: This is the first we hear across the table informally that Steve Pratt has been rolled on the fire levy. The fire levy now is not to be repealed, we are told. Does Steve Pratt know that? Has he actually corrected the record? Has he said he was wrong, that he did not consult—well, who would he consult, which leader or which deputy leader?
A debate such as this does beg comparison between the government and the record of the Liberal Party in government in relation to health. The Liberal Party, in its last time in government, closed 114 beds in our public system. We have increased the number of beds by 147, and we will continue to increase beds at the rate of 20 a year in a sustainable way.
The Liberal Party in government funded mental health at the lowest per capita level in Australia. We have doubled expenditure on mental health. The Liberal Party in government actually engendered and created the Gallop royal commission of inquiry into disability services, which came down, as we all know, with a most damning assessment of the provision of disability services under a Liberal government. We have reversed completely the state of affairs that we inherited in relation to disability services within the ACT.
The Liberal Party in government refused to provide nurses within our public system with the wages that they deserved. The Liberal government left us, on coming to government, with an unfunded EBA nurses agreement, which I think in our first year of government cost us $16 million.
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