Page 125 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 10 February 2010
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If they are looking to buy their first home, would it be harder in 2010 than it was in 2001? Clearly, it has got harder. If they are sitting in traffic, are they spending more time in traffic or less time in traffic on the same road? For many Canberrans, it is obviously a case of spending more time. In areas such as education, have things improved? What about public housing and the delivery of it, and basic services? Is childcare more expensive, more accessible or less accessible?
In all of these areas, after 8½ years of ACT Labor government, we have seen things go backwards. And the Productivity Commission has blown the whistle on this. For a long time, this government has said: “Well, no, things aren’t that bad. Look, we’re a bit better off than some of our state and territory colleagues.” The Productivity Commission has blown the whistle on that argument. This report, essentially a report card on 8½ years of ACT Labor, says that things have not got better; in fact, things have got worse. In all of these key areas, things have gone backwards.
It is worth going through a summary of some of what the Productivity Commission had to say in relation to the performance of the ACT Labor government. This is a report card on their time in government. I will give a bit of a summary of some of the key findings. Under this Labor administration, we have the worst median waiting time for elective surgery, at around twice the national average; the lowest number of public dentists in the country; the lowest bulk-billing rates in the country; the lowest number of public hospital beds per capita; the highest childcare fees; the highest spending on prisoners per day; the highest rate of householders experiencing financial stress who also receive commonwealth rent assistance; and the highest rate of cases pending in the Magistrates Court for longer than six or 12 months.
That is just a summary of some of the findings of this report. What it says, and I think it was summed up in the Canberra Times, is that we are paying more and getting less. Canberrans, after 8½ years of ACT Labor, are paying more and getting less and, on so many indicators, doing worse than the rest of the country.
We need to pause there for a moment and ask: who are we being compared with? We are being compared with, amongst others, New South Wales. New South Wales Labor is actually, in some areas, delivering better services than the ACT government.
Mr Coe: Things are grim when they’re the premier state!
MR SESELJA: It is grim when ACT Labor falls behind its New South Wales Labor colleagues. That is what we need to put into context, because we have got Labor regimes all around the country except in WA. We have seen some terrible Labor governments right around the country. Out of all of our interstate counterparts, New South Wales should stand as the worst example, yet the performance of ACT Labor, in a number of these areas, falls behind even New South Wales.
It is worth going through some of the really important ones, because in so many areas we are paying more and getting less. If we look at childcare, childcare rates in the ACT are the most expensive in the country, at $65 per day for long day care. The government might not care about that, but for thousands and thousands of Canberrans,
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