Page 4964 - Week 13 - Thursday, 12 November 2009
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MR STANHOPE: It may have a range of other missions—part of its mission is to run public hospitals—but it was established with an explicit purpose, among many, to care for the dying. It has an internationally regarded reputation.
Mr Hanson: Is that why you want to purchase Calvary, because they don’t do so well? How disrespectful of you!
MR SPEAKER: Mr Hanson!
MR STANHOPE: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I do not think I have ever heard such an outrageous outburst by a member of a parliament in the context of a religious order, an order devoted to the care of the dying, and for me to be shouted down by Mr Hanson is just incredibly disrespectful of that order. I am explaining the mission—
Mr Hanson: You are limiting the scope of what they do. They care for the sick and the dying and you are trying to limit their mission for the sake of your argument.
MR STANHOPE: Mr Hanson asked his question but he does not want an answer. He does not want me to answer why it is that the government believes that the Little Company of Mary, with its particular mission to care for the dying, might actually enhance its reputation and capacity to do that if it owned Clare Holland House. That is what I am doing.
Mr Hanson: You will use anything to try to make a political point.
MR STANHOPE: That is quite remarkable. I am asked a question by Mr Hanson and have been shouted down for the entire time that I have been speaking. (Time expired.)
MR SPEAKER: A supplementary question, Ms Bresnan?
MS BRESNAN: Thank you, Mr Speaker. What is being done by the ACT government to address the significant concerns that are being raised by groups such as the ACT Palliative Care Society regarding the sale of the hospice?
MR STANHOPE: I thank Ms Bresnan for the question. I am acutely aware of the concerns raised by the Hospice and Palliative Care Society. It is an issue in which I have a deep and abiding interest. The government have had a number of consultations and meetings with the Hospice and Palliative Care Society over the last few months, and have asked the Hospice and Palliative Care Society to set out, in detail and fully, all of the society’s concerns in relation to the possible transfer of ownership. They have raised upwards of a dozen issues with both the ACT government and the Little Company of Mary. Not all of the issues raised are issues that the ACT government has the capacity to respond to on its own. But with respect to each of the very legitimate and significant issues that has been raised by the Hospice and Palliative Care Society with the ACT government, the ACT government has responded as fully as possible to each and every one of the issues that has been raised with us.
Indeed, in correspondence to the government as far back as June this year, the president of the Hospice and Palliative Care Society indicated that those issues have
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