Page 2599 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 7 August 2013
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that the government realised, “We’d better do something about this. This dragging our feet, this constant delay, the meandering between various budget amounts and various models is unsatisfactory.” I think it is fair to say we have been saying that for some time.
It is not unusual that this sort of situation occurs with an infrastructure project with this government. Mr Smyth in the previous motion outlined some of the delays and the cost blowouts we have seen from Minister Corbell, but we have also seen it in health. The Canberra Hospital car park went from an initial proposal of $20 million to $40-odd million, a $13.5 million blowout, and it was 18 months late. We also have the bush healing farm, which is still not anywhere to be seen seven years after it was promised, and the Gungahlin health centre was 20 months late. In this budget alone there is more than $100 million dollars of project rollovers and reprofiling in health infrastructure. This is a very public project; it has been subject to some scrutiny by the media, but this is just a drop in the ocean of the $100 million of delay that we have seen.
The point we need to remember, though, is that this is not just about the dollars; this is not just about delays in infrastructure. We need to remember the impact on people. Ms Berry made some good points about the concerns we all have for people facing a mental illness. Ultimately, they are the losers. The people with those mental illnesses are the people who have been the losers for the last eight years while this government has dragged its feet.
It has become apparent that people working within our health system who have to treat people with mental illnesses in inappropriate facilities are also losers. I do not know if it is the case, but it is quite feasible that a number of the assaults on our nurses have occurred because people who should have been in a secure facility that was promised years ago were being treated in a facility that was inappropriate. So there are real impacts on lives as a result of this delay. It is not just the dollars; it is not just the bricks and mortar; it is the patients, the nurses and the staff at the AMC who have to deal with the consequences of this government's delay.
Because of the embarrassment in the media, we now have this desire from the minister to push this project through and the call for it to be fast tracked. And we support that. I have raised some issues with the Quamby site. I am not convinced the government has done the necessary work to look at other sites. The minister may assure us that she has, but, as I say, I am not convinced of that. But what is clear is that the government is locked into the Quamby site. The opposition is now in a position where we have a choice to either support the secure facility at Quamby or not, because it is the only option on the table. Given that is the option, we will support it.
In terms of what fast tracking means and agreement to consider legislation, we will wait to see that. There are some caveats around the motion moved by Ms Berry to make sure the community gets the appropriate amount of consultation, but we will, essentially, offer in-principle support for the intent of what the minister is trying to achieve. But the opposition reserves the right to make amendments to the legislation after we see it and if there are significant or minor problems with it to make sure it is appropriate legislation.
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