2003-05-29
- Madam Speaker Braham took the Chair at 10 am.
MINISTERIAL REPORTS
Parliamentary Sittings in Alice Springs
Parliamentary Sittings in Alice Springs
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, the people of Alice Springs and Central Australia deserve the sincere thanks of all members of this parliament for their enthusiastic welcome for the first regional sittings of our parliament since self-government.
Members: Hear, hear!
Ms MARTIN: Over 3500 people visited the parliament during its three days of sittings. It was inspiring to have standing room only at Question Time, and to hear remarks from the many residents who had never seen their parliament in action before. It was well worth the cost; it was made very clear that the carping by the opposition that it was too costly and too much trouble did not have any traction in Alice. The regional sittings certainly put a big dent in the Berrimah Line. So many told members just how informative it was to see their elected representatives in action, to hear debate, and to understand a little how laws are made and policies enacted.
The efforts of Madam Speaker and her staff to ensure school students attended were well rewarded with around 1200 students attending and showing remarkable interest.
However, it was not only the sittings that attracted visitors. Government hosted a number of functions for people who really deserved recognition by parliamentary members. They were not the silver circle that the opposition used to court exclusively when they were in government. For example, I was delighted that the Minister for Central Australia, together with the Minister for Emergency Services and the Minister for Parks and Wildlife, were able to pay tribute to work of emergency services volunteers in Central Australia. These volunteers put in thousands of hours of work, particularly with the bush fires that occurred last season, without expecting recognition. The Minister for Central Australia tells me it was an honour to be able to thank them to their faces.
Another key function was the focus on education, when this government acknowledged the valuable input so many teachers, parents and others put into educating the young people of the Territory. Other functions included young people, workers, business people and community and local government elected representatives. In all, well over 850 local Centralians attended functions. The opposition called this a party; I call it recognition of the work of these people. In fact, I was delighted to have more than one come up and say to me that this was the first time they had ever been invited to an official government function, and how pleased they were to receive such an invitation.
The spin-off to the local economy was substantial. Retailers were saying that people in Alice Springs were feeling good and, therefore, they spent. Hotels, restaurants and hire car companies did well. My government made the point of rotating the venues for functions including the Alice Springs Golf Club and Olive Pink Botanic Gardens, as well as the more usual hotel venues.
Several visitors added touring into their itinerary. For example, Madam Speaker tells me that visiting presiding officers and their staff took the opportunity to visit sites around Alice Springs and to see Uluru.
Madam Speaker, I put on the record my thanks to you and your staff for the enormous effort put in to ensuring the success of these sittings. Thank you.
The convention centre was a top class venue for parliament; it looked professional, the IT support was superb and the functions were smoothly organised. It showed its quite amazing versatility in changing from parliament to Youth Parliament then, in a matter of a very few hours, being a sales room for the yearling sales, and the next night being a ballroom.
I also thank the Alice Springs Town Council for its support: the welcome sign coming in from the airport, the open air council meeting and the barbecue they hosted to support the regional sittings were much appreciated.
Finally, I am pleased to announce that following the tremendous success of the Alice Springs sittings, we will be returning in two years, 2005, which, I am sure, will be very much appreciated by the people of Central Australia.
Mr BURKE (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, I will pick up the last point first. It is very pleasing the Chief Minister has made the decision that parliament will return in Alice Springs in 2005. I give this commitment: that if the CLP is in government - which we surely hope - we will maintain that commitment; we will ensure that we return to Alice Springs. One can only hope that the layout and the performance of the Assembly meets the high standards that were met in the first regional sittings because there is no doubt that it was a very enjoyable sittings.
I really enjoyed it, actually. I enjoyed the fact that there were people up in the bleachers, and you could really get into some of the debate. I was particularly pleased by the performance of the Alice Springs members. I was particularly pleased by our members from Alice Springs who performed admirably …
Members interjecting.
Mr BURKE: The members of the government might laugh, but one thing that did come back to us all the time was the performance of the Minister for Central Australia, who did not look at ease at all. Through the whole sittings, he was mumbling and nervous - right from the opening ceremony. I would have thought this was your real time to perform, minister. It just did not seem to be quite there. Maybe between now and 2005 you will recover some sense of self-confidence and really get into it in 2005. By then, of course, you will either have resigned or crime will be under control in Alice Springs.
One of the soundings we did undoubtedly have from Alice Springs - including the doorknocking that we did, and the numbers of people who came out to express their concern about crime in Alice Springs, all vetted of course by your staff who did their level best to try to intimidate them - was concern about the level of crime in that community, as there is right across the Northern Territory.
It is also pleasing from the Chief Minister’s statement to see how far $130 000 really goes: we filled all the hotels, all the tourist places were happy, there was so much money flowing in Alice Springs and it is great! It is like the loaves and the fishes; for $130 000 this Labor government can really turn it on!
Madam Speaker, congratulations to you and your staff on your efforts.
Mr WOOD (Nelson): Madam Speaker, I think I may be able to speak on behalf of the other Independent when I say that I support the return of parliament to Alice Springs in two years time. It is an important thing to happen. I have always been a supporter of taking government out to the people - not that that can always occur for practical reasons.
A member: At Humpty Doo!
Mr WOOD: We have not had a Cabinet meeting at Humpty Doo, I must admit, and I am waiting for the time when we do have a meeting at Humpty Doo.
A member: We had one, the CLP.
Mr WOOD: Yes, but we have not had one in the rural area.
It was good not only for the people of Alice Springs, it was good for those members of parliament like me who do not come from that region. It gave me an opportunity to learn about issues in the Central Australian region, which is very important when you have to vote in parliament on Territory-wide issues.
Once again, I thank everybody in the Legislative Assembly for all the work they did in organising it. I know there has been an issue about cost, but I imagine that once this is done on a regular basis, things can be streamlined, and those costs would be fairly regular from then on.
I thank all the people of Alice Springs for the hospitality and a most enjoyable time there.
Madam SPEAKER: I thank all members for their enthusiasm and support for returning to the Alice.
Members: Hear, hear!
Bullying in the Workplace
Mr STIRLING (Employment, Education and Training): Madam Speaker, I want to report to the House this morning on the issue of bullying in the workplace, and the actions that this government is taking to ensure that it does not become a feature of working life for Territorians – outside this Chamber, Madam Speaker.
Members interjecting.
Mr STIRLING: That is to allow the opposition to get away with what they try to do, and that is bully on most days.
In ordinary terms, bullying refers to behaviour that a reasonable person would consider offensive, intimidating, humiliating, or that degrades, ridicules or insults the person’s worth. It can be physical, psychological, emotional or social, and it may range from overt aggressive behaviour to covert passive behaviour. Most obviously, bullying can take the form of physical violence or threats of violence and sexual harassment, but workers’ lives can also be made miserable by other subtle and inappropriate workplace practices that I mentioned.
When the issue was first brought to my attention, the question I asked was: how prevalent is it? I have to say the figures research does throw up are fairly shocking. Despite the fact that bullying has been identified as a national issue for both the government and private sector, there has been very little research carried out in Australia. International research shows between 25% and 50% of employees experience bullying at some time in their working lives. Extrapolated to the Australian population, it would mean that about one million Australians experienced the direct effects of workplace bullying in the last 12 months. Apply those figures to the Northern Territory, and it would be possible, if they correlate, that some 500 people would experience workplace bullying on any one day. That would be an intolerable situation.
I want to be quite clear and unequivocal about this: this Labor government will not tolerate practices that can be interpreted as workplace bullying. As we create more jobs here in the Territory, we want to ensure that the quality of working lives of Territorians remains high on the agenda. In keeping with this, as one proactive step, our largest employer, the Northern Territory Public Service, in cooperation with unions, will undertake to develop a service-wide strategy that defines, recognises and addresses this issue of bullying in the public sector. The Employee Assistance Service will work in partnership with Griffith and Central Queensland Universities to conduct a confidential Work Environment Survey across the whole of the public sector.
The survey will assess the behaviour or circumstances that could be termed bullying in the workplace and the prevalence of that behaviour. When the results of the survey are to hand, the Public Service Commissioner will report to me on the extent of bullying in the Northern Territory public sector, and develop a sector-wide strategy to address it.
It is my intention, as minister responsible for the public sector, to ensure that our largest organisation leads by example as a responsible and ethical organisation. It will send a positive message to staff, clients, investors and key stakeholders of other organisations that this type of behaviour - that disrupts productivity and quality, and undermines customer service - will not feature in the modern, efficient workforce that this government is building.
Mr MILLS (Blain): Madam Speaker, I welcome this move by the government to survey the public service to ascertain the scope of bullying. Members on this side are united in standing against any incidence of bullying in the workplace. All honourable members would be, I am sure, aware of apprentices in particular who have suffered at the hands of senior workplace members at the beginning of their working life.
We stand with you, minister, in ascertaining the level of bullying in the workplace. Once we have ascertained that, we will be very interested to see what happens as a result of collating the information. We are talking about uncivilised behaviour that needs to be addressed when it occurs. Rather than counselling and education, we really need some strong action because if it is wrong, it must be dealt with, particularly by those who have responsibility to care for and nurture those entering the workforce.
Perhaps we could expand the definition of bullying. In discussions with the union, issues as to unpaid overtime could also be brought into the equation as examples of covert bullying. I will be looking to see that we ensure that instances of unpaid overtime are brought to account so that we do not have that coercive regime where workers are obliged to go the extra mile but not rewarded or recognised.
Mr STIRLING (Employment, Education and Training): Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Blain for his support for this strategy. I do not want to pre-empt what we might find out there by way of this study, but I welcome the interest and support shown.
I have put on the record an offer for a briefing with the Office of the Commissioner of Public Employment as the study unfolds so that the member for Blain can stay informed. I thank him for the support and urge him to stay in touch with us on it.
Regional Crime Prevention Councils
Dr TOYNE (Justice and Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I rise today to welcome the establishment of another three Regional Crime Prevention Councils: Darwin, Nhulunbuy and Yolngu. The Regional Crime Prevention Councils support a key element in this government’s crime prevention strategies, Partnerships Against Crime.
The three new councils are in addition to those already established and operating successfully in Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, Katherine and the Warlpiri communities of Ali Curung, Lajamanu, Willowra and Yuendumu. On Monday this week, I was delighted to open the inaugural meeting of the Darwin Crime Prevention Council, which had been formed in partnership with Neighbourhood Watch groups in Darwin. It has members from the community, all levels of government and peak indigenous, business and community organisations.
In Nhulunbuy, the Office of Crime Prevention has been working for several months with the Alcan company, an ATSIC sponsored Law and Justice Committee, indigenous organisations and community groups as well as my colleague, the member for Nhulunbuy. I welcome the start of the Nhulunbuy Regional Crime Prevention Council and congratulate those individuals and organisations for their commitment to work on crime solutions for their region.
The Yolngu Regional Crime Prevention Council has also commenced its work, combining the communities of Galiwinku, Ramingining, Maningrida and Gapuwiyak. Led by Galiwinku, through the Knowledge Centre Project, Law and Justice committees have been established in each community and together, they form this indigenous regional council. I congratulate the members of this council on their determination to tackle crime and justice issues in their communities and to make a difference working in partnership with this government.
Unfortunately, though, the Leader of the Opposition does not support this approach. He has said:
- When it comes to partnership agreements with government, they’ve become a joke.
The hard working members of our Regional Crime Prevention Councils would certainly disagree with the Leader of the Opposition’s somewhat wintry assessment. It is a great pity to hear the opposition still talking down community involvement and our communities.
Starting today, all of these crime prevention councils are coming together for the first gathering of the Crime Prevention Network that we are establishing across the Northern Territory. They will be meeting here, and they will be sharing ideas with us and developing a Territory-wide approach to these very important issues within our community.
I welcome the additional three crime prevention councils. We are moving rapidly to create an extensive network around the Northern Territory, and I look forward to working very closely with these community groups in tackling the issues that occur in our communities.
Mr MALEY (Goyder): Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for his short statement. Crime prevention councils do have a role in terms of community input but, ultimately, the fundamental issue is you have to help the victims, you have to deal with the problems. An example is one that appeared on the front page of the paper yesterday. You have a young man who, with a group of about 30 other kids, knocked the front teeth out of another fellow at the skate park and left this fellow scarred for life. He goes to court, he is effectively released and, quite frankly, shows absolutely no remorse.
The real issue is economic downturn. Because this government does not have the initiative to create any wealth creating projects, crime will increase. We see these little tinkerings around the edges, the get-tough-on-crime motherhood statements. At the end of the day, they mean very little. It is about dealing with the problem, dealing with the economy, and ultimately, it is about helping the people who are the victims.
We have seen this government amend the Crimes (Victims Assistance) legislation to make it more difficult for a victim of crime to receive compensation. We have seen this government, in the budget papers handed down this week, put more money into Correctional Services to try to keep people out of prison. We are talking about security bans, integrating offenders back into the community. It seems that the real emphasis of this government is to try to keep people out.
There are no initiatives, the economy goes down, crime goes up, and rather than tackle the hard issues, all we have are these motherhood statements, a couple of feel-good tinkerings on the edges but, ultimately, it is not going to solve our problem because the fundamental problem is crime. The government does not even accept, and we found that it was fairly obvious in Alice Springs, that there is a serious problem.
Dr TOYNE (Justice and Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, as well as reminding the crime prevention groups of what the Leader of the Opposition has had to say about the government forming partnerships with communities, I will be very pleased to tell them that the shadow spokesman seems to think their contribution to these important issues is tinkering around the edges.
The shadow spokesman can waffle on with his social engineering theories about the economy and crime, but we are getting on with it. We are out there with the community; we are going to develop the ideas, implement them, and bring crime down in the Northern Territory.
Mental Health Services
Mrs AAGAARD (Health and Community Services): Madam Speaker, I rise today to address this government’s response to the growing community needs for mental health services. Mental health is one of the most important challenges for us to address. It was identified by my departmental review as one of the priority areas we need to address.
For many years, the Northern Territory has faced rising demand for mental health services, driven by greater awareness of services available and increased community expectations. Mental illness affects one in five Australians. Every year, more than 800 000 adults and 95 000 children and adolescents experience depressive disorders. On a global scale, in 1990, depression was the fourth largest contributor to disability of all health conditions. If the current trends continue, depression is expected to be the second largest contributor to disability and ill health by 2020. The Northern Territory needs to start addressing this issue now.
In the Northern Territory, 41% of the population is less than 25 years of age compared to 34% nationally. Young adults have a greater likelihood of developing a mental disorder than older age groups, and it is recognised that the incidence of mental health problems is higher in Aboriginal communities. Most unfortunately, the suicide rate, which has been static nationally, has been on the rise in the Territory. Of particular concern is the rise in the suicide rate in the indigenous community. My department is currently completing a Northern Territory Suicide Prevention Strategy to address this very serious issue.
Despite these trends, which have been obvious for years, mental health as an area has been consistently neglected and under-funded by previous governments. The Bansemer Review found:
- This sector of the health system is, despite the production and subsequent non-implementation of a series
of reports and studies over the past decade, under-resourced, fragmented and poorly supported.
A very sad situation.
This historic neglect of this area in the Northern Territory is well documented. In 1999-2000 under the previous government, the Northern Territory was the second lowest ranking jurisdiction in Australia in terms of per capita funding in mental health. This government is determined to turn around these years of under-funding and neglect. I am proud to be able to announce the injection of an additional $7.2m into mental health services over the next three years. This will begin with a $900 000 boost in the coming financial year, followed by an additional $6.3m over the next two years, being $2.4m in 2004-05 and $3.9m in 2005-06. These figures represent a major and long overdue boost to mental health services funding in the Northern Territory.
The new funding will employ and train clinicians in the child, youth and adult mental health services; enhance partnership approaches to provide better care for people with co-occurring mental health and substance misuse problems, and children, youth and their families and people with mental illness in the criminal justice system; and expand consumer and carer support services in the non-government sector.
In particular, we will be addressing a number of priority areas in the next financial year.
the first is specialist child and youth mental health care. Despite the relatively high child and
youth population in the Northern Territory, the proportion of available resources allocated in
the past to this area is limited, particularly in Central Australia;
area for increased activity, and we will be looking at ways to improve services in those areas;
These are particularly important given the key role non-government organisations play in providing
support services for people with mental health problems, as well as educating and supporting carers;
and
the last priority area for 2003-04 is that of forensic mental health care for individuals with mental illness
in the criminal justice system. In particular, we intend to strengthen the capacity of services to respond to
the department’s obligations under the new Mental Impairment and Unfitness to be Tried provisions of the
Criminal Code introduced in June 2002.
These priority areas for action over the next year are just the start. There is more to do and this government is committed to doing it. The resource increases I have outlined for 2004-05 and 2005-06 will continue and extend our action in these vital areas of mental health. For the first time, we can be confident that government is addressing the historic levels of inaction and under-funding that have afflicted this area of mental health for so long.
Ms CARTER (Port Darwin): Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for her report this morning, however I am a little sceptical about whether or not there will be real outcomes as a result of what has been announced. I have been travelling with the Substance Abuse Committee, particularly in remote areas, and the need for improved mental health services is very apparent. However, last financial year, $109m was allocated to community health services. This has been cut …
Members interjecting.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker! The member for Millner has used the phrase ‘nut case’ which is particularly insensitive in this debate.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Millner, did you use such a term? You should withdraw.
Mr BONSON: Madam Speaker, I withdraw the remark.
Ms CARTER: The budget to community health services has been cut by $10m from $109m to $98m. Given that community health services are already on the ground in remote areas dealing with problems, I believe that mental health services out bush are going to deteriorate over the next 12 months.
There are certain areas, in particular those in the member for Arafura’s electorate, that desperately need urgent attention, and to cut community health services is appalling. I do not believe you are going to be able to get these mental health people on the ground as quickly as needed, and cutting community health services, which already provide some level of services out there, is a very poor effort.
When you look at this budget book, these figures for mental health improvements do not really stack up. All that is mentioned here for mental health services is an increase of $183 000, let alone the millions that you are talking about. The proof will be in the eating of this pudding. We look forward to it occurring, but I have my doubts.
Mrs AAGAARD (Health and Community Services): Madam Speaker, the honourable member is definitely misleading the House on this one. There has been a reduction in 2003-04 as a result of Commonwealth funding that will not continue beyond 2002-03, namely Health Connect, Northern Territory District Medical Officers Transitional Program and Coordinator Care Trails. These are Commonwealth projects, which were one-off; they will not be continuing. It has nothing to do with mental health.
In relation to mental health, as I mentioned in my statement yesterday in response to the budget, the Commonwealth-funded Mental Health Information Project in 2002-03 and the acquittal of Commonwealth funded projects where revenue was received in 2001-02 are the reasons for the change in the mental health funding. It is not a question that we have not put in $900 000. We definitely have. These were one-off projects which people knew were finishing. There is no reason for them to continue.
Reports noted pursuant to Sessional Order.
STATEMENT BY SPEAKER
Quorum of the Assembly
Quorum of the Assembly
Madam SPEAKER: Honourable members, before we go on with Government Business of the Day, I want to make a few comments in respect of the calling of a quorum. I have become aware of a number of issues that have been raised over the last few days in relation to calling a quorum.
You should be aware that although there is no direct provision in standing orders of the Assembly, there is a long standing convention that it is highly disorderly for a member to call attention to the state of the House when a quorum is present. I have given warnings to new members who were not aware of that provision. From now on, it will be my practice to name and suspend that member from the House. Please make sure that when you call a quorum, you count correctly, and that the Speaker is included in the count.
Furthermore, Standing Order 39 provides that when the attention of the Speaker or the Chair has been drawn to the fact that there is not a quorum of members, no member may leave the Chamber. It has been pointed out to me that two members did in fact leave the Chamber. In future, they will be asked to return and you may not leave until a quorum is present or two minutes has elapsed. I point out that standing orders state that the bells should be rung for two minutes. That may be a mistake on our part, because it is three minutes for a division, and it is something I will raise with the Standing Orders Committee today.
I also remind you that as elected members, it is well established parliamentary convention that it is the duty of all members to form a quorum in the House. You all have a duty to be present. I do not think I need to add anything to that.
Members interjecting.
Madam SPEAKER: Order! You can have your debate about that later. You should all take notice of what I have said.
POISONS AND DANGEROUS DRUGS AMENDMENT BILL
(Serial 159)
(Serial 159)
Bill presented and read a first time.
Mrs AAGAARD (Health and Community Services): Madam Speaker, I move that the bill be now read a second time.
This bill amends the Poisons and Dangerous Drugs Act and has been drafted to address and revise a number of provisions in this act. These amendments are further evidence of this government’s tough stand against illicit drug use in our community. This government has no time for illicit drug dealers and manufacturers who profit from the misery of young people and others. We are serious about tackling the hard issues facing our society, to deliver the outcomes Territorians want: a safer and healthier community for themselves and their children.
This government has introduced laws that make this position unambiguous, and the measures detailed in this bill specifically focus on those issues associated with the misuse and over-prescribing of prescription medications.
Drug addiction is devastating to the individual, their family and the community in general. Evidence shows addiction can lead people into committing break-ins and other crimes to fund drug habits. This government is committed to breaking the drug-crime cycle through measures like these in this bill and initiatives like the NT Drug Courts. At the same time, the measures in this bill help to depoliticise the rehabilitation of drug dependent individuals and show compassion for the distress suffered by people and families, and the need to alleviate it.
These amendments specifically address the following:
1. the introduction of a new control system for Schedule 8 and declared Schedule 4 substances
incorporating the recommendations of the Task Force on Illicit Drugs;
Schedule 7 substance, including a demonstration of competency; and
To begin, I will discuss the measures to be implemented for Schedule 8 substances, which give effect to the recommendations made in the final report of the Task Force on Illicit Drugs, and incorporate the outcomes from a consultancy commissioned from the Queensland Health Department for my department.
Schedule 8 substances are defined as controlled drugs, which require restrictions around their manufacture, supply, distribution and possession for use to reduce abuse, misuse and physical and/or psychological dependence. Examples of Schedule 8 substances are the many forms of prescription morphine, such as MS Contin, Anamorph and Kapanol.
To date, the Northern Territory has been the only jurisdiction without legislation requiring doctors to obtain a permit prior to prescribing any Schedule 8 substance. We know we have had a problem with morphine dependency in the Northern Territory. When this government came to office, prescriptions for morphine in the Northern Territory were being dispensed at seven times the national average. As a result of measures we have introduced, this rate is falling, but there is more to do. This and a number of associated issues are addressed by these amendments.
The major challenges in providing treatment with Schedule 8 medications relate to safety and accessibility. People who need them must be able to access them, and the potentially serious associated risks must be minimised.
To date, the Northern Territory has had a voluntary contract system in place to restrict the prescribing of Schedule 8 substances for each patient to one doctor, and the dispensing to one pharmacy. This includes a requirement to notify the Poisons Control Branch in my department. It has been strongly supported and used by a vast majority of medical practitioners, but it has not been mandatory.
The bill will repeal sections 31 and 31A of the act and substitute them with a system that subjects all Schedule 8 substances to a base level of regulatory control, including limits on patient numbers and mandatory notification to Poisons Control.
Medications of particular concern such as the maintenance pharmacotherapies, Buprenorphine and methadone, will be declared to be restricted and subject to additional regulatory controls, including authorisation to prescribe. Exemptions will apply in respect of palliative care, those diagnosed with a terminal illness, hospital inpatients, emergency medical treatment and other prescribed circumstances, such as the prescription of Ritalin by paediatricians to certain children with Attention Deficit Disorder.
As maintenance pharmacotherapies have been unavailable in the Northern Territory until recently, people who have developed opiate dependency have evolved considerable skill in convincing doctors to prescribe morphine for pain. Doctors have generally given patients the benefit of the doubt rather than to refuse adequate pain relief. It is understood that it can be difficult for patients to admit that their primary or real problem is opiate dependency rather than pain, due to ‘drug addict’ labelling, stereotyping and stigmatisation.
National best practice guidelines recognise that patients commencing opiate pharmacotherapies, such as Buprenorphine and methadone, will remain vulnerable to relapse for some time. Each patient will differ in his or her circumstances, and to promote patient safety, it is critical that individuals be monitored on a daily basis until their circumstances are stabilised. Therefore, we are promoting a system of daily supervised dosing until it is determined the patient’s circumstances are safe enough for unsupervised doses to be provided. Patients can become accustomed to the less rigorous program that characterises chronic pain prescribing. These factors can act as disincentives to facing the real problem of dependency, which is an important step in beginning the recovery process, and impede entry to a program where maintenance pharmacotherapy is only one element, albeit important, in the complex process of regaining control.
Treatment for pain can lead to dependency and dosage escalation to levels that exceed the pain requirement, to the ultimate detriment of the patient. To minimise this risk, it is important to ensure proper vigilance and review of patients being prescribed opiates for pain.
The bill brings the Territory in line with all other jurisdictions in Australia, and applies different levels of regulatory control based on the potential for harm of the medication being prescribed, not the condition being treated. It removes the wording ‘for the purposes of addiction’ and, where appropriate, replaces it with ‘a medical condition’. Also in line with all other jurisdictions, the period for which a Schedule 8 prescription remains valid will extend from two to six months. The maximum supply period, however, will be set at two months unless authorised by the Chief Health Officer, a statutory position within my department.
In order to maximise safety, and in line with the recommendations of the Task Force on Illicit Drugs, the Northern Territory Restricted Schedule 8 Policy and Clinical Guidelines, which are based on national standards, will be regularly reviewed and approved by the Chief Health Officer. An important part of the introduction of the new measures contained in the bill is the establishment of a Schedule 8 Clinical Advisory Committee with appropriate membership to provide advice to the Chief Health Officer. This committee will provide expert advice on a range of issues related to treatment with Schedule 8 substances. The committee has the following functions:
to advise in regard to the competency required by medical practitioners to supply
Schedule 8 substances;
of authorisations on a peer review basis;
This committee will be chaired by the Chief Poisons Inspector within my department, and the remaining membership will be prescribed in regulations. The Chief Health Officer will make appointments for a period not exceeding two years, and members outside of government employ will be remunerated. Committee members will also be provided with immunity against liability whilst performing their role. The Chief Health Officer will be able to exercise his or her discretion should there be occasion when the committee is unable to reach a majority decision on matters before them.
Members interjecting.
Madam SPEAKER: Order! Member for Daly, member for Millner, order! Minister, you have the floor.
Mrs AAGAARD: The bill will allow for the use and safe storage of Schedule 8 substances in hospitals, wards and departments of hospitals in accordance with the directions of a medical practitioner or a scheduled treatment protocol.
Mr Bonson interjecting.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Millner, order!
Mrs AAGAARD: Specialist clinics located in the grounds of Alice Springs and Royal Darwin Hospitals will be permitted to dispense Schedule 8 medications by a pharmacist without the presence of a third person. This allows these clinics to operate in a manner equivalent to a community pharmacy and enables efficient and effective utilisation of staff time.
Provisions for the disclosure of information between medical practitioners, pharmacists and delegated officers within my department in the course of appropriate treatment are included to facilitate effective administration of the new control system. This allows information to be received, provided and maintained in relation to Schedule 8 and declared restricted schedule for supply and use. It is an important element of the bill, which will ensure maintenance of the control system, and be utilised as an early warning system against over prescribing and/or doctor shopping.
A related issue is the increasing concern over the abuse of Schedule 4 substances, namely benzodiazepines. The bill allows for the Chief Health Officer to declare a Schedule 4 substance as restricted by notice in the Gazette and, therefore, subject to regulatory control. This can include restrictions in relation to possession, use, supply, prescription and administration.
The second area to be addressed is the adoption of the Standard for Scheduling of Drugs and Poisons. This is published by the Commonwealth under the Therapeutic Goods Act 1989 and endorsed by the Australian Health Ministers Advisory Committee, AHMAC. It is well recognised by all states and territories as a guiding national practice. The bill allows for the adoption of Parts 4 and 5 of the Standard for Scheduling of Drugs and Poisons, along with Appendices A, C, D - excluding item 1 - G, J and any other appendix specified by notice in the Gazette. These parts have been regularly adopted in the past by a much more ineffective and labour-intensive process. This amendment allows for a much more efficient and streamlined process to be adopted.
Packaging and labelling requirements will also be adopted from the Standard for Scheduling of Drugs and Poisons under regulations, with the caveat that if any inconsistency arises between the standard and Northern Territory policy, then the power to override by notice in the Gazette is retained.
The third area for consideration in this bill is the measures which permit conditions to be set on authorisations under section 53 of the act to possess and use a Schedule 7 substance, including the demonstration of competence. Schedule 7 substances are those poisons used for agricultural, horticultural or pastoral purposes such as Mirant and cyanide. The bill allows for the Chief Health Officer to impose conditions on the authorisation to possess and use Schedule 7 poisons. These include that the individual requesting has provided sufficient reason to possess and use, as well as demonstrates the necessary competency in the safe use and handling of the poisons. The competency requirement will be performance based, and minimally prescriptive. In practice, it is likely that evidence of competence will be provided in the form of a certificate of competency from a recognised trainer.
Finally, I would like to inform the House that the bill contains a number of consequential and housekeeping changes that have been considered necessary for effective administration of the act. In particular, the penalties applied to offences in the act have been converted to penalty units and standardised throughout to bring them in line with the government’s tough-on-drugs policy. The penalties have been aligned with offences in corresponding legislation such as the Misuse of Drugs Act and the Kava Management Act. The bill and the measures contained within it have been developed in direct response to a perceived public health risk, and to support our policies to get tough on drugs and to tackle the drug-crime cycle. They are no more restrictive than provisions in other jurisdictions. A regulatory impact analysis of similar proposals found them to be compliant with national competition policy principles.
This bill is an important and long overdue step towards implementing an effective control system for the supply and use of Schedule 8 substances in the Territory. In addition, it allows for the adoption of the national Standard for Scheduling of Drugs and Poisons and places competency-based standards in the authorisation for the possession and uses of Schedule 7 poisons. I commend the bill to honourable members.
Debate adjourned.
MOTION
Estimates Committee – Referral of Appropriation Bill 2003-04 and Budget Related Documents
Estimates Committee – Referral of Appropriation Bill 2003-04 and Budget Related Documents
Mr HENDERSON (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that, pursuant to paragraph 5 of the Order of the Assembly dated 27 February 2003, the following Budget Papers, together with the Appropriation Bill 2003-04 be referred to the Estimates Committee for inquiry and report:
Budget Paper No 1 – Budget Speech 2003-04;
Motion agreed to.
APPROPRIATION BILL 2003-04
(Serial 147)
(Serial 147)
Continued from 28 May 2003.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Madam Speaker, the budget from a shadow minister’s point of view, and in particular mine, was very disappointing. What I propose is to go through my shadow portfolios and then deal with some welcome announcements in relation to my electorate of Araluen.
In relation to tourism, there can be no doubt that the budget is an appalling one and the facts speak for themselves. A comparison of the budget papers shows that there has in fact been a cut in funding. The budget allocation in last year’s budget was $28.16m; the allocation in this year’s budget is $27.2m. That is a cut of more than $1m to the Tourist Commission at arguably the most critical time in its history. We asked the minister about it in Question Time yesterday and, with great respect to him, he appeared not to understand it.
The member for Katherine last night outlined why it was that there was a cut, and I do not propose to repeat his comments, but there can be no doubt that there was a cut. I defy the minister to explain to anyone how it is that $27m is more than $28m. The figures are clear. The facts are $26.164m was allocated in 2002-03. In this year’s budget, anticipated expenditure is $26.05m. The allocation in this year’s budget is $27.202m. So, less has been allocated this year than last year.
To make matters even more interesting, the minister issued a media release on 3 March in which he said that the total revised budget, after the mid-year report, was $27.9m, not $27.2m. So he is already $700 000 off the mark in terms of his media release of 3 March. In the Budget Overview at page 2, it says:
- There is a record $27m for tourism.
Now, that is $900 000 less than the minister’s press release on 3 March, hardly a record given that last year’s allocation was in fact $28.16m. What all of those figures show is that we simply cannot trust the minister and the government, but we do know, and Blind Freddy can see, that there is a bottom line that the NTTC budget has been cut. It is unfortunate that the minister’s answers and assessment of the budget have been inconsistent for a few months now in terms of how much money is being injected into tourism.
There is another fact that I am sure will be of interest to everybody, and that is the cut to the number of staff at the commission. In 2002-03, there were 95 people employed at the commission. Now, it is not just me saying this; this was in last year’s budget paper. In 2003-04 according to Budget Paper No 3 at page 261, there are 72 people employed. We knew that staff cuts were happening and, very sadly, we have been proven correct. So even at a cursory glance, it is clear that there have been cuts.
It gets worse. The so-called new funding of $1.5m is not new in any way, shape or form. In the Treasurer’s speech, he referred to an additional:
- …$1.5m for domestic and international marketing .
It is not new. Specifically, as to the $500 000, it was in fact allocated in last year’s budget and the sources for that can be found in the budget speech at page 9, when the then Treasurer said:
- An additional $1m over two years will be directed to the Territory’s international tourism marketing.
A further source emerges from an answer given at the Estimates Committee hearings and that was:
- The other $0.5m has been earmarked for use in the 2003-04 financial year.
In the budget paper issued this year called Building Territory Business, it is again referred to as ‘additional marketing expenditure’ but it just is not and it cannot be.
Second, in relation to the remaining so-called new $1m of the $1.5m, it has already been announced and allocated and in this regard, I refer members to the minister’s media release of 17 March in which he says:
- Government has provided an additional $1m for advertising on TV and other electronic media as
part of the campaign.
The minister was at pains to tell everyone about this $1m which is why he wrote his message on the front cover of the NTTC newsletter this month, in which he says:
- In the last two months the government has committed an extra $1m to the domestic advertising campaign.
It is not new, and it is misleading to suggest that it is, as has been done throughout the presentation of this budget. The minister’s media release on budget day seems to perpetuate the myth because he again refers to:
- …additional $1m for domestic advertising.
Elsewhere in the budget papers, such as the Budget Overview at page 2, there is a curious declaration that there is a:
- …record $27m for tourism including a $1.5m boost to marketing.
Hardly a record, given that in 2002-03, $28m was allocated. It is hardly a boost when the money is not new. Even when he was asked on budget day to tell us about government initiatives for the tourism industry, he said in respect of funding that:
- Our record over the last three to four months with an extra $1m in domestic marketing campaign,
$500 000 per annum in international marketing.
So it seems as though when he was asked that question by the member for Millner, he temporarily forgot to maintain the fiction that the budget was new. There is nothing new in the budget and everyone in the industry is aghast and genuinely very surprised that that is not the case.
No new injection of funds. What we knew would happen has happened, and that is that this terribly important industry, this portfolio, is held by a very junior minister and he has obviously been sidelined by his Cabinet colleagues. They take no notice of him, although given various comments he has made over the last couple of months, that is arguably not surprising.
Finally, on the question of funding and advertising campaigns, the minister might, at some other opportunity, like to clarify why it was that he misled Territorians in his media release on 17 March. In that media release, this minister announced that there was a new campaign which he described as:
- The $3.8m campaign which began nationally on 15 March with full colour advertisements in
national newspapers will involve extensive advertising across Australia and so on.
This is staggering because the minister in that media release actually called it a new campaign worth $3.8m. It was plainly wrong, and I know he knows that it was wrong. Arguably, the minister should be censured for that untruth. Fortunately, members of the industry knew that it was wrong and it was downright misleading to suggest that it was a $3.8m campaign in a media release when he knew that that was not the case.
Furthermore, in the cover to the NTTC newsletter this month, the minister said that he had committed that famous extra $1m to the domestic advertising campaign:
- …bringing the total advertising spend to $3.8m.
So he did not launch a new $3.8m campaign on 17 March, as his media release said; he merely topped it up at the instigation of the industry, I might add, and then he dishonestly called it a $3.8m campaign. It was an astonishing error, but I suggest a very deliberate one.
There are other aspects contained in the NTTC budget, and I refer members in particular to page 264 of Budget Paper No 3. Again, it was touched upon by the member for Katherine, but it is worth going back to. The estimate for trade and consumer shows in 2002-03 was 99. The estimate for this coming financial year is 93. For reasons that escape all of us, the NTTC proposes to attend fewer consumer shows – truly astonishing. Furthermore, in respect of the marketing activities undertaken, last year the estimate was 223, this year it is 214. At a time when the industry is having an extremely difficult time, the NTTC, guided by this incompetent junior minister, will attend fewer trade shows and engage in fewer marketing activities. That is astonishing on any basis.
Further, the budget fails to deliver for the Regional Tourism Associations. There is no additional funding. I know the minister was going around to the RTAs not so long ago giving them winks and nods, suggesting that their funding would be retained, which, I might say, came as a great relief to them. However, there was an expectation, quite rightly, that the RTAs, the peak industry bodies for tourism in the Territory, might receive a leg-up from this government. Alas, that did not happen. There was no additional funding to the RTAs and, again, many people were genuinely shocked by that.
As for other announcements, again, there were misleading suggestions - in fact, it is in print; it is not a suggestion. In print in this budget, it says an additional $1.4m for Virgin Blue services to the Territory. However, that is closely followed by a bracket confirming that this is part of the original money allocated, namely $4m over two years. So why it is described as ‘further funding’ in Budget Paper No 2 at page 49, I do not know. It sums up how shifty this government is when it comes to the presentation of this; it is smoke and mirrors. They say: ‘This is new, this is new’, but when you scratch the surface, we find that there is nothing new, certainly as far as tourism is concerned. The minister seems to think that everyone in the industry is an idiot. Well, they are not. They are very impressive people with good intellect, and their intellect is much more than the minister’s will ever be. They are aware that there is nothing in this budget for them and I repeat that they are terribly disappointed by it.
I note in Budget Paper No 3 at page 264 that last year there was no allocation for convention bids, but that the government has sought to rectify the problem by this year allocating $50 000. That is a curious figure because if that is all the government has allocated in an incredibly competitive market at the best of times, a much more competitive market now, then I would suggest that $50 000 is not enough.
We understand that the NTTC entered a bid to hold ATE in Alice Springs next year, but the Northern Territory was outbid by another state. This proves what we have been saying for some time. In the Territory, we are being outgunned by other states and territories in terms of marketing our product. It is incredibly competitive every day of the week, but given the enormous pressures on tourism currently, the industry needs an injection of funds and, quite frankly, $50 000 for a convention bid budget is not enough, and this is why we lost the bid for ATE. This government needs to put its hand in its pocket, spend money to make money to make the lives of those in the industry much better.
Is there a commitment by government to tourism? Well, it is very hard to see it in this budget, quite frankly.
Dr Burns: What about the Mereenie Loop Road?
Ms CARNEY: I will come to that. It is very hard to see a commitment.
To other matters, I note that preliminary planning has commenced on the Darwin Convention Centre. I would not mind being a planner under the Labor government, because I reckon they would be making a killing at the moment. They seem to be planning just about everything. They plan for this and they plan for that, and they are going to do this and they are going do that. Well, we want them to actually deliver, and so does everybody else.
However, members will be interested, perhaps the members on this side more so than government members, to reflect on the blue glossy document called Building a Better Territory issued in June 2002. This is a document I keep in my office much of the time. Under the heading ‘Priority Actions’ at page 19 of that document, it says:
- …continue to promote the development of the Darwin Convention Centre.
We would like them to stop promoting it and stop planning it; we want them to do it. Maybe by the time I am an old woman, it may have been done. I am sure the building industry and other people in business would appreciate a vote of confidence from this government, but it is certainly not in this budget.
I also note that there is $1m for Stokes Hill Wharf. That is welcome. The government says that Stokes Hill Wharf and the Wharf Precinct are important. Infrastructure projects at any time by any government anywhere in Australia are always welcome. There is no doubt about it. However, I could not help but notice that over the last few days this third Tourism Minister has been at pains to talk about infrastructure projects. I do not blame him because when there is nothing in the budget, you must go to other infrastructure things. That is why the minister has been talking about it when, in the glaring absence of additional funding to the industry, namely to the Northern Territory Tourism Commission, what else can he do? He must talk about infrastructure.
It is important to remember - and much more important, I suggest, for the minister to remember - that while the infrastructure for tourism is terribly important, we have to get the tourists here in the first place so they can enjoy the infrastructure. Again, I say: there is nothing in this budget that is targeted, even superficially, to get the tourists here.
In terms of the Mereenie Loop Road, we are on the record that we welcome the announcement. However, we need to drill down a little more. In 10 years time, the Mereenie Loop Road will be finished. I ask the question: does the announcement for the Mereenie Loop Road bring one tourist to the Northern Territory now? It does not. Will the Mereenie Loop Road bring a tourist here in six months time? No. Will the Mereenie Loop Road bring a tourist here in 12 months time? No. People - the human beings who are the faces of tourism; the mums and dads and others - who own and operate tourism businesses do not want to look down the track to 10 years time. They will go broke beforehand unless there is some assistance offered by this government.
In conclusion in relation to tourism, there is nothing new. We thought - and I do not think it is unreasonable for us to have had expectations such as the following – that there might be something about extending the vouchers brought into existence for the Arafura Games to other Australians for other months of the year. That did not happen. We thought - and I know industry reps have been talking to the minister about this - we might see something about some sort of subsidised fuel scheme, but there is nothing there. There is nothing about actually getting international airlines here, such as investigating subsidising landing fees or things like that. Again, I know that industry reps have been talking to the minister about this.
In a nutshell, there is nothing creative, nothing innovative, and nothing to assist the industry at the worst time it has ever experienced. All we have is more rebadging of some old announcements; nothing practical and nothing new. There is nothing in this budget that brings one tourist here, nothing that gives the Northern Territory the marketing edge over other states. That is an appalling situation, and certainly an astonishing one.
In relation to parks and wildlife, I welcome some of the announcements. I will not give the government a serve in each and every respect. There are some positive announcements about the Territory’s parks, and I congratulate the minister for that. I suppose it has something to do with him being a more senior minister in Cabinet; his colleagues obviously take him more seriously. As I said, that is illustrated in the budget. We liked the announcements in relation to Litchfield, Wangi Falls, Casuarina Coastal Reserve, Gregory Park and the other parks mentioned in the budget papers.
I also note with interest that Labor has, since it has come to government, warmly embraced the Owen Springs Reserve, one of those fine CLP initiatives, a can-do product that the CLP had vision for. It saw there were opportunities there. In stark contrast to this government, we bought Owen Springs. I am glad to see that funds have, at long last, been allocated by government which has pulled its collective finger out to get on with the job. Especially as a person from Alice Springs, I welcome announcements in that regard. However, while investment on infrastructure is important for the future, I again remind members that the time for action to assist industry is now. It is now. People are going broke.
I turn now to the area of women’s policy. Again, this amounts to a shocker. Women’s policy has not done well under this government and, professionally and personally, I am stunned and I find it immensely disappointing. My view is that government members should hang their collective heads in shame in terms of what this budget does not do for women, and more particularly, the very few times women are mentioned in it. I was surprised that there was nothing in particular in the budget for women which prompted me to undertake an electronic search of all of the budget papers.
On budget day, I was going through all the documents, obviously thinking about my shadow portfolios and I could not see references to women. I undertook an electronic search of the budget papers and the outcome is astonishing. There are only 17 references to the word ‘women’ in the 2003-04 budget. Of those 17 references, nine of them are either footnotes or headings. I seek leave, Madam Speaker, to table a table I have prepared called References to Women in 2003-04 Budget.
Leave granted.
Ms CARNEY: Thank you, Madam Speaker. One can only assume, and I am sure others do, that the Treasurer has little regard for women because women were only mentioned eight times. I am surprised by this because, even though many think the Treasurer is something of a dinosaur, I at least thought he was a decent one. But alas, for me, and no doubt many other women, particularly Labor women around the Territory, his first budget will forever be marred by his failure to include women in it. Labor politicians say that they are committed to advancing the interests of women, but you would not know it judging from these budget papers.
It is something of an irony that the CLP - ‘the boys club’ so-called by the Labor Party - for years published with the budget papers an entire document Women in the Budget. Last year, this Labor government dispensed with the Women in the Budget publication. That was its right. One year later, however, women barely rate a mention. Women are little more than a footnote.
It is appropriate that I remind members about the CLP’s Women in the Budget document. This was a document that you will find, out of all the people in the Northern Territory who pick up the budget documents - and let’s face it, there are not many - I will bet you, London to a brick, women always went for this document. They just did. The aim of this document, Women in the Budget, was to provide Territorians, and women in particular, with a tool to evaluate the government’s policies and resource allocation with respect to women in the Territory.
It outlined the direct impact of government expenditure on women and girls, and it reported specifically on policies and programs of the last year as well as highlighting plans for the coming year. Underpining this document’s existence was the need to increase awareness of the effect of government policy and expenditure on women and girls. I would have thought that this government would be interested in maintaining this publication, especially with the Territory’s first woman Chief Minister at the helm. Not only did they dispense with it last year, but this year’s budget is a no-brainer when it comes to women: 17 references when it comes to women in the Northern Territory budget papers, of which there are hundreds of pages. You must be joking.
The Treasurer calls this budget ‘business friendly’, yet there is not one mention of women in the budget paper called Building Territory Business. The government abolished the Business Women’s Consultative Council and replaced it with nothing. That is its right, but it replaced with nothing. In these budget papers, there is nothing specific to assist women in business and that is more than just disappointing.
There is no specific mention of child care for women other than in the health budget, and it is a passing reference. There is no mention in the budget papers about women’s health other than one footnote. There is no mention of community infrastructure support and social and economic issues for women. There is no mention of mentoring. There is no mention of links between business and government. There is no mention of discrimination. There is no mention of programs promoting equal opportunities in employment or career development. An extraordinary situation, and I suspect it is unprecedented.
In terms of women in this budget, I am sure many women from both sides of politics will be, as I am, immensely disappointed. I was also amazed not to find the same budget document that the government produced last year, Building our Community. In that document, there was at least the fairly interesting heading of ‘Meeting the Needs and Aspirations of Women’. That book does not exist any more. There are no headings like that any more.
In the budget papers, there is no reference to the Office of Women’s Policy and it is noteworthy that the Women’s Advisory Council is only mentioned as a footnote. I am happy to declare that I am a member of the Review Panel for the Women’s Advisory Council, and our team is working hard to come up with a new model because the Chief Minister wanted to review it, as is her right. But I was worried about there only being reference to the Women’s Advisory Council in a footnote, and I hope that it does not spell the end of the Council before the Review Panel provides its recommendations because that would, of course, preempt the outcome of the review. Perhaps there is another explanation, and in Estimates I look forward to hearing it.
I note in Budget Paper No 2 at page 41 there appears to be an increase in the Domestic Aboriginal Family Violence strategy but it does not appear to be very much. I also notice that under the area of Community Advancement, there appears to be a variation of $118 000 in total. It is difficult to tell how that relates to various government activities, but again in relation to the answer, I look forward to the Estimates Committee hearing.
At page 6 of the document called Supporting Families, it says:
- Labor proposes to establish an Office of Children and Families within the Chief Minister’s department.
That office has now been taken out of the Chief Minister’s department and is in the abyss called the Health department. I do not think that is satisfactory. Perhaps we will have more answers at Estimates.
Finally, in relation to electorate matters, I welcome the upgrade of air-conditioning at Gillen Primary School, however I note there is no allocation for the Ida Standley Pre-school. The Treasurer may recall that we attended that school together last year. Although some remedial works have been undertaken, I understand, I cannot see any capital works being commenced at that school. That is disappointing. The Steiner School, and I know the Treasurer is aware of this, sits in my electorate. They are looking for some land and they have not received any allocation as yet.
The Araluen Cultural Centre sits in my electorate, but in Budget Paper No 3 at page 166, there is a significant cut to the Arts and I am staggered by that as well, so the Araluen Centre staff will not be happy. I note the $2.5m for Traeger Park. I am pleased to see the government has kept one election promise.
In conclusion, in terms of tourism, the budget is a shocker and the government knows it, but, importantly, those in the industry know it. They are not happy. They have been treated badly, and that is an outrageous situation.
In terms of women’s policy, it is hard to be the Shadow Minister for Women’s Policy because it is hard to see what policies exist for women in this budget. On balance and in a nutshell, I was terribly disappointed with the budget, particularly in terms of what it does not do for tourism and how badly it treats women.
Mr McADAM (Barkly): Madam Speaker, I rise to speak in support of budget 2003-04 as presented by the Treasurer.
The Barkly is a huge region, larger than the state of Victoria, with a growing population of around 7000 people, almost 45% of that being under the age of 26 years. To properly serve such a vast slice of the Territory as a local member is a difficult task, but one I am honoured to perform. As the member for Barkly, my constituents expect me to respond to their needs and the challenges they face in raising their families, in their workplaces, in growing their businesses, and maintaining the great lifestyle of the Barkly.
They expect the Martin government to work hard for them and their communities, to assist them to live in safer communities. They also expect their government to improve educational outcomes, and to work hard at our health system. They expect their government to protect the unique Barkly environment, and they expect that indigenous people, who make up more than 51% of the population, will be given a fair go. More importantly, the Barkly people relate to a government that has the capacity to respond. Having their local member as part of the government, I believe, assists them to be able to meet some of those challenges.
I am delighted to be part of a government that has been fiscally responsible, that has brought under control the previous government’s reckless fiscal mismanagement, a government that has consistently received plaudits from respected economic analysts such as Standard & Poors, Access Economics and Moody’s Investor Service, and plaudits for consistently meeting its fiscal targets and sticking to its responsible fiscal management strategy.
The Barkly asks for a responsive and responsible manager of Territory finances and, as I said, I am proud to be part of a government that fills that bill, that is being responsible and responsive.
As for the budget highlights for the Barkly, let me start with a simple statement: no new taxes. This is the response Barkly businesses wanted out of this budget, and I am proud to say we have delivered it. This Martin government is about creating jobs for our young people and all those who wish to participate. We are also very proactive in terms of building safer communities, supporting our very dedicated health professionals, police officers, teachers and, of course, our many fine public servants who operate in communities throughout my electorate. We are also very proactive in engaging the private sector in partnerships to achieve outcomes which in the long term will benefit us all.
The capital works budget will provide a boost for local businesses with the construction of a multipurpose health and aged care facility, estimated at a cost of around about $600 000; $250 000 to refurbish the Ali Curung Police Station; a revote of $510 000 to build a new renal facility in Tennant Creek; plus a further $200 000 for the railway terminal; $300 000 for stage one lining to the drains in Tennant Creek; and a further $95 000 for urban enhancement projects.
It is important to place on record the fact that our educators are the generators of so much that is good about life in the Barkly. Our hard-working teachers deliver for Barkly families every day. Unfortunately, the previous government did not value their commitment and allowed their work conditions to be downgraded alarmingly. This government has responded to that need, and housing for remote teachers will benefit from this budget, particularly for people in small communities. There will be a house built at Canteen Creek, and I know that it will be much appreciated. The upgrading of the Tennant Creek Training Centre will provide access to many who wish to avail themselves of further studies.
Without a doubt, the single most important issue for many in the Barkly is education, and the review into secondary education will assess existing services and how they are provided and delivered on the ground. It will also compare outcomes between the bush and rural areas and, of course, the Territory and other jurisdictions. I suspect many of us already know what some of the outcomes might be, or some of the issues that will arise from the review. While I am confident that the minister for Education and the Parliamentary Secretary assisting the minister for Education will apply themselves in a very committed, dedicated and professional manner in trying to make up the difference, I must say that this is stark contrast to previous CLP education ministers.
Access to good health services is every Australian’s right, and the Barkly is no different from other remote parts of Australia. In responding to the challenges for providing such a service, this government, as I said, in terms of dollars, will fund a multipurpose facility for health and aged care services in Tennant Creek, and the renal unit.
I congratulate the Minister for Health and Community Services in respect to providing $290 000 for telephone health advice and referral services for people in the bush. This initiative, along with the retention of the Medivac plane, will restore and address some of the concerns of people who live in my electorate. The development of the northern Barkly zone, which I understand to be around $900 000, is also much needed and will complement the existing health services and, of course, the initiatives I have just mentioned.
The Barkly has some of the oldest ground water in the world, and it is a very precious commodity. Funding has been committed to monitor and assess the quality and quantity of the region’s ground and surface water resources. This initiative is very welcome, along with the drilling program in Epenarra; both the community and the owners of the pastoral station, the Cloughs.
In last year’s budget, $1m was allocated to upgrade and fix hot spots on the Culvert Hills Road and the Barkly stock route. The announcement of $500 000 to do the same in respect of the Sandover Highway will make a real difference to the communities and the pastoral properties in the southern portion of my electorate.
The people of the Barkly expect to be able to live in safe communities. This government is committed to supporting them. Comments from the member for Drysdale regarding our Safe Communities Strategy are welcome. Of course, there will always be people who cast doubt on its effectiveness, and that is life; a political reality. I accept their positions, but no one will ever doubt our capacity and commitment to making a difference, unlike the continual sniping and negativity on the other side. I say to the other side: get real, begin to understand that the Territory has grown up, we are more mature, we know we have problems and we are working hard to fix them.
For example, Borroloola, a small community in the Gulf, recognised that they had problems and the only way they could see to solve those problems was to sit down and talk them through. That was blackfellas and whitefellas. This approach was in stark contrast to the politics of division portrayed by the previous government. We are working in partnership with a wide range of community organisations and other tiers of government to address the problems of unacceptable behaviour in all our communities, including Tennant Creek and Borroloola. I say to the opposition: surely, it is worth the effort to improve quality of life for all.
Tourism development is important to the Barkly. I welcome the $30 000 to convene a tourism development workshop in the Barkly. This workshop is designed to value add to the existing products such as Battery Hill Mining Centre and the Nyinkka Nyunyu Cultural Centre due to open in the next few months. More importantly, this workshop will have the capacity to value add to the experience of people visiting our region, and I refer to Borroloola and Nicholson.
I predict that the Nicholson area will become a major tourist area within the next 10 to 12 years. I will go so far as to say that it has the potential to rival Kakadu. The Gulf, including Borroloola and Robinson River, will be, and probably are right now, the premier recreational fishing destination in Australia. I am proud to say that many of the indigenous people in that region see the potential and have already established small fishing camps or eco-tourism type set-ups which they hope will provide well for their future.
King Ash Bay, which we all know about, is another wonderful facility that, with proper management and planning, will also become a premier destination. Other destinations that need to be promoted include the Davenport Ranges, and the waterhole known as Longreach, which is west of Elliott, has the potential to become a first class bird sanctuary.
Discussions are taking place between the traditional owners, the department and the Central and Northern Land Councils about the Warrego to Lajamanu Road. Subject to these discussions, the road will be the shortest route from the Eastern seaboard to Western Australia to places like Broome. It will become a real four wheel drive adventure. These are not dreams; I am suggesting that big things can happen from just $30 000.
The completion of the railway will provide some potential for economic growth in the future, which means jobs for Tennant Creek and the region. Tennant Creek has the potential to become a major transport hub for freight, just as Alice Springs was when the rail ended there, to provide for freight from the east through to Asia for export, and for import purposes from Darwin down south and to the east.
Presently at Warrego and Peko there are something like 8.5 million tonnes of magnetite, which is contained in the tailings. I know there are plans to try to find a market for that into Asia. That has the potential to add jobs and to support the rail. 110 kilometres to the north of Tennant Creek near Banka Banka, Bootu Creek Resources will be developing a manganese mine probably by November 2004. Obviously, they will have to use the rail to move their product to Darwin for overseas export.
There is also some capacity in respect of trucking cattle for live export. Of course, this requires further discussion. The point I am trying to make here is that all of these issues are going to be discussed on 17 June in Tennant Creek, and it augers well for the future of the Barkly and the Territory economy in the long term. Not all of these projects are going to get up, of course, but I daresay that a high percentage of them will bear fruit.
There was a view that the Barkly was once the major economic driver for the Territory due to its gold production and beef industry. I do not think anything has changed. It will remain that, and it will grow. There can be no doubt that the expansion of the Macarthur River Mine, subject to further discussions, will provide a massive economic boost in terms of my electorate and the Barkly generally.
The Peko Rehab project is a small project mining the tailings about 15 to 20 kilometres east of Tennant Creek, which is jointly owned by Sitzler Savage, and is another exciting project which will add to our economy.
I have already mentioned Bootu Creek Resources, which has the capacity to employ about 100-odd people.
Last, but not least, is Giants Reef. This small gold mining exploration company has been working very hard over a long period. In fact, they were the only company undertaking active exploration in the area for a long time. I do not want to pre-empt any release, but I am confident enough to say that this project will get off the ground within the next few months. I have no doubt at all that as a result of this single development, new mines will discovered in the Chariot area.
Madam Speaker, I say: why wouldn’t you want to live and invest in the Barkly, knowing that the Martin government’s fiscal strategy is sound, responsive and responsible? I applaud and support the Treasurer’s 2003-04 budget. Well done, Treasurer.
Ms LAWRIE (Karama): Madam Speaker, I rise to congratulate the Treasurer on his first budget.
This budget is both responsible and responsive to the needs of Territorians. I know that the Treasurer, his staff and Treasury have worked tirelessly for many months now to put this budget together. On behalf of my constituents, I acknowledge and appreciate their tireless efforts.
There is some good news in this budget for the constituents of Karama and Malak. An additional $2.5m has been provided to top up the government’s Itinerant Strategy initiative of last year. This will make a real impact on the amenity of the Karama and Malak area. Many people have complained for years that we had a growing itinerant problem throughout the Territory. A report was done - a collaborative effort was made between various groups and agencies including the government - but never implemented, never acted upon, left to sit on the shelf and gather dust like many reports of its nature in the past. I am pleased that our Minister for Community Development had the energy and the drive to implement an itinerant strategy last year.
The funding that we provided in the budget last year has already borne fruit. Today at the Karama Shopping Centre, if there is an issue or problem with itinerants, we are able to call the Community Patrol. We no longer have to wait until staff come on at night when the problem is already out of control. We call in the morning. At 10 o’clock in the morning you will see a Community Patrol van appear and patrol around our area. The residents are saying to me clearly: ‘Thank you. It took too long coming, but we are really pleased now that we have an opportunity to do something about what is unacceptable behaviour’. The unacceptable behaviour ranges from drunkenness - at 11 o’clock in the morning there can be groups of drunk people. They then humbug residents who are trying to go about their normal business of buying milk and some bread for their kids. We have had incidents of assault as a result of people saying: ‘No, I haven’t any money to give you’.
That has changed. In the last six weeks, for the first time in nearly a decade, we are living in a quiet shopping centre. It is actually quiet out there. You can walk around during the day and not be harassed, not see groups of drunken people, not feel a sense of shame and sorrow at seeing those drunken people with young children hanging off the groups. This change is a direct result of the resources that government has committed to the Itinerant Strategy. The strategy works because it works with indigenous people; it does not aim to punish indigenous people, who are often escaping from situations in their communities.
The electorate of Karama, which includes Malak, includes many very good indigenous families who have lived there from the outset, who have raised their children there. There are indigenous grandparents who continue to be the babysitters for their children’s children when they come home from school. I value and highly regard these indigenous families in our community. They say to me: ‘I am ashamed. This mob are bringing shame on me. I don’t want this to happen’. Together, we have been able to work, as a government, with indigenous agencies to turn around and address the problems, and the needs these itinerants have.
I congratulate Leon Morris and the staff of the Itinerant Strategy. I know how hard they have been working. I know that the referral centre set up by Larrakia Nation at the airport has processed hundreds and hundreds of people to give them an ID. We take such things as an ID for granted, but an ID to people means they can access health services, they can get in the system and access housing, the kids can go to school. These are basic, simple tools that no-one was facilitating to create an environment where people could be allowed into the system, rather than locked out on the fringe of society and blamed for problems those decades of neglect have caused.
The Itinerant Strategy has a strong link with health services, referral services, and drug and alcohol agencies. Mission Australia has a sobering up shelter, so if an itinerant is picked up because they happen to be drunk, they will be moved to the sobering up shelter and placed in an appropriate referral situation.
Many people, as I explain to constituents, are not drinking; they are sitting around and gathering. There needs to be further work done on identifying what are reasonable community gathering areas because, culturally, people are used to gathering together. In the dominant culture, we gather by going to someone’s house, whether it be a barbeque or a dinner party. Certainly, the culture of community-based indigenous Territorians is to gather in public places, out in the open. There is further work to be done in identifying what I call ‘gathering places’ so that people are not being punished for gathering, because they are not drinking. Not all people referred to as itinerants are drinking, yet they are punished for wanting to literally sit at the shopping centre on a chair - and I have seen this happen: a few mothers will sit with their children, they will be having a chat, and people will want to move them on, people will look at them in a bad way when they are not doing anything wrong.
The resources that the government has allocated will allow us to burrow down in to this and discern the difference between people who are drunk and abusive, obviously in breach of the law and disturbing normal society, from other people who aren’t the drunks but who have other needs that we need to support as a government.
I congratulate the Territory government on the $2.5m for the Itinerant Strategy. It is making such a meaningful difference already in my electorate. I know that with additional resources to the Community Patrol, to sobering up, to returning people to communities, to bringing the elders in, it will continue to have a long-term and fundamental impact on our society and, finally, an impact for the better rather than the worse, as have seen in the past few decades.
Law and order is a big issue to my constituents, and I am delighted that there is provision of $3.93m in this financial year to continue the implementation of police recruits. I look forward to the further expenditure that has been set aside, about $3m, that will deal with any additional, recurrent funding required as a result of the O’Sullivan Report. As we are aware, the O’Sullivan assessment is looking into police needs, requirements, and numbers in the Northern Territory. On behalf of the constituents of Karama and Malak, I have written a submission to the O’Sullivan Review. I know that there are many things that we can do as a government to improve law and order in respect of our policing. I thank the minister for police for his wholehearted commitment to moving forward rather than playing a game of: ‘There is nothing we can do’.
The previous government, I know, stripped away the operational policing budget. When we came to government, there was a division called Public Places Patrol with no staff attached to it. There was no one tasked by police to patrol, which is community and preventative policing. Since I discovered that in discussions with police and alerted the police minister, we now have a Public Places Patrol back. We have patrols going around and doing the proactive policing that the community requires, expects, and deservedly receives now.
I also acknowledge the expenditure of $1.5m for ongoing enhancement of PROMIS technology that the police use to log incidents. PROMIS in itself is a system that requires and prompts follow-up from police. The police have worked very hard under difficult conditions for many years now, and one of the consistent complaints they have had is PROMIS, as a technological system, has had too many problems. $1.5m is no small amount to go to addressing the problems they have with PROMIS. Many experts in policing argue that PROMIS is actually a good system. However, there were technical issues and glitches with the PROMIS system we had here. I hope that $1.5m resolves any outstanding concerns police officers, who are very hard-working indeed, had with that database system.
I acknowledge and welcome a project near and dear to my heart, which is the expenditure of $300 000 for a Mounted Patrol facility to be constructed at the Peter McAulay Centre in stage 2. I wholeheartedly support the use of mounted police. The community responds well when they see police on horseback. Children approach because they like horses; parents are with the children. They chat to the police and talk about what they saw, what happened in their street, what is happening at the neighbour’s house. It is an incredibly important community policing tool, and one which is undervalued by jurisdictions throughout the world. I am pleased to see that the Territory is starting to lead the way in recognising the importance of mounted police because they have been working out of absolutely disgusting facilities at Berrimah for far too long. I know because I have been out there. I have had to step over pieces of floor that are missing. I have looked at the stables which the horses have had to be stabled in, and they have been disgusting. Therefore, I know the mounted police certainly deserve the $300 000 that will be spent on a new police facility for them.
I want to acknowledge the $150 000 in additional resources to implement the government’s Drug Court strategy. There is a clear link between drugs and crime. The problem is that in the past, this link has been denied; the fact that drugs were prevalent in society was denied. We are a government that will not deny the reality; we are saying that we will take on the battle against drug dealers. We want to eradicate the traffickers from our society.
I also acknowledge the $110 000 provided for Neighbourhood Watch programs. Karama is creating a Neighbourhood Watch committee, and the funding to support these committees and their initiatives is crucial for community safety. There is a $400 000 community crime prevention initiative, which enables crime prevention committees to access grants - again, to address community safety. Certainly, the Karama Crime Prevention Committee will be looking at submissions to that $400 000 pool.
In addition, we have $150 000 to continue trials into Community Justice and Mediation centres. Many local members will understand the importance of this. A lot of people come to our offices with a dispute between neighbours. It is something that they do not want to go to the court stage, yet is a dispute they have been unable to resolve. I believe these justice and mediation centres are critical in overcoming localised issues that can be resolved with accredited and appropriately trained mediators. I congratulate the Minister for Justice and Attorney-General on that initiative.
In the area of juvenile crime, we know that there are gangs operating in Palmerston and throughout Darwin. That is not news to anyone. It has been the case for years; it has been ignored for years. Last year, the Northern Territory government took the first major step in addressing this situation which was $320 000 provided to establish a Northern Suburbs Youth Beat and the Minister for Health and Community Services is to be congratulated for implementing that program. What it discovered, however, is that youth workers employed to go out in the street at night to engage with the youth and assess why they are congregating in gangs, why they are exhibiting at-risk behaviour, had no one to refer them on to at night. Legislatively, they needed to approach Family and Childrens Services to report that they had identified a youth who needed to be in the care of Family and Childrens Services. The office was open only during the day.
This budget provides funding of $0.5m to FACS to provide a 24-hour service, so that in the future the police or the youth beat who identify a youth who needs to be delivered into the FACS system will be able to access the appropriate duty senior social youth worker at FACS, a critical step to addressing the whole societal issue of youth at risk exhibiting dangerous behaviour. I congratulate the government for that $0.5m initiative. It is one that many people will not necessarily trumpet, but fundamentally it will mean an enormous difference to youth in Darwin. I look forward to working further with the youth beat and the police to ensure that youth and their needs are being identified and addressed.
Critical to this picture of addressing the causes, and not just glossing over and dealing with the symptoms, is the establishment of a school-based attendance officer at Sanderson High School who will work local primary schools in my electorate: Malak, Karama and Manunda Terrace. This is a welcome initiative, and I congratulate the government for providing school-based attendance officers. It is striking that school-based attendance officers have not existed in the system. They should have. We should have inherited government with truancy officers. Unfortunately, another area of neglect that we are addressing now. We are turning the tide.
$460 000 has been provided to support students with a disability in our schools. This is very exciting and will make a meaningful difference to how teachers can cope with their classes. If you have a child with a disability in your class who is not receiving appropriate support, that is a one-on-one support worker that we call ISAS, teaching the class is problematic. So the $460 000 that has been pumped in to ISAS, that is the support student services, is critical to ensuring that all children in that class are given the opportunity to learn and to meet their MAP testing. If we get education right, we are building for the future. There is nothing more important than building for the future. Critical areas of funding have been identified, critical areas of need are known, and the government is putting the dollars where they need to go. I congratulate the minister for Education and his Parliamentary Secretary for this $460 000 additional funding.
In the area of health, I welcome the allocation of $3.6m for a new emergency department, intensive care units and operating theatres at Royal Darwin Hospital including $800 000 for a chiller. There is a $900 000 major upgrade to mental health services throughout the Northern Territory. Many people will know and understand that mental health is an emerging social issue. People are failing to cope with the stresses of today’s society and mental health is a major growth area in health services, yet it has not been appropriately funded in the Territory until the government accepted the Bansemer Report, which identified underspending in mental health, and put the dollars where the need is: $900 000. I congratulate the minister for her hard work in getting that into the budget. I know that it is difficult in tight financial times to find new money. You have found the new money and you have put it where it needed to go. So, thank you very much for that. I have many mental health patients sitting in my electorate who are going to be the recipients of this.
$400 000 to upgrade dental services. This will be good and welcome news for pensioners and families living in my electorate. I have many lower socio-economic constituents who rely on the public dental service, and I won’t bore the House with the long and many tales about inadequate service to date. $400 000 will go a long way to upgrading the service. It is critically needed, and I congratulate the minister for that initiative. $290 000 to establish a health call service to provide health advice and referral. We know there is a shortage of GPs in Australia. We know there is a shortage of GPs in the Territory. Karama has lost its local GP. Access to health advice and referral services is very difficult for families these days. It is extremely reassuring for a parent or an aged pensioner to be able to pick up the phone and make one call and know they are getting through to health advice. That advice will let them know whether they need to see a GP or present at the hospital. That critical first call will go a long way to alleviating a lot of the log jams in the Territory’s health system, and I congratulate the minister for that initiative of $290 000.
There is $1.57m additional in there for more nurses. We know we need more nurses; every hospital in Australia needs more nurses; every hospital in the world needs more nurses, but unless we allocate the funds, we cannot go out and get them. This budget allocates the funds. I congratulate the government for sticking by its promise to improve our health system. The backbone of the health system is our nurses.
In terms of our economy, $127m to reduce the cost of living - welcome news indeed for the constituents of Karama and Malak. This government is not shirking its responsibility in terms of reducing the cost of living. Importantly, we are putting the dollars in to continue the cap on power prices. Members of the opposition might want to scoff at that initiative, but it makes a major difference to people who are struggling to get by, who just have enough dollars to feed the family, keep the roof overhead, get the kids to school and work. So keeping a cap on power prices is great assistance to Territorians, and I congratulate the government for that.
I congratulate them for the fuel subsidy that has been provided, for pensioner concessions, to continue the childcare subsidy – critical for families - grants, stamp duty concessions for home buyers, housing assistance for low income earners.
I also want to congratulate the government for the $3m head works for a Darwin Convention Centre. What this means is that we are going to have a convention centre. Come what may, there will be a Darwin Convention Centre. We are allocating the dollars: $3m to create the path to a convention centre. It is fantastic news and I congratulate the government for putting the dollars in for that project.
Darwin Business Park, capital works of $7.6m to construct the train-port terminal requirements – tremendous news for the construction industry and putting in the essential infrastructure the Territory needs to become a trade hub. Naturally, where we sit at the top of Australia, our proximity to Asia, this is very much about laying the foundations for the future of the Territory.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Karama, may I interrupt for a moment? May I ask you to continue your remarks at a later time to accommodate three meetings over the luncheon adjournment?
Ms LAWRIE: I am more than happy to, Madam Speaker. I seek leave to continue my remarks at a later time.
Leave granted.
TABLED PAPER
Power and Water Corporation – Statement of Corporate Intent 2002-03
Power and Water Corporation – Statement of Corporate Intent 2002-03
Mr STIRLING (Treasurer): Madam Speaker, I lay on the Table the Statement of Corporate Intent 2003-04 of the Power and Water Corporation and a Revised Statement of Corporate Intent 2002-03 of the Power and Water Corporation.
MOTION
Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee - Referral of Statement of Corporate Intent 2003-04 of Power and Water Corporation
Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee - Referral of Statement of Corporate Intent 2003-04 of Power and Water Corporation
Mr STIRLING (Treasurer): Madam Speaker, I move that, pursuant to paragraph 1 of the Order of the Assembly dated 27 February 2003 establishing the Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee, that the activities, performance, practices and financial management of the Power and Water Corporation with reference to the Statement of Corporate Intent for 2003-04, be referred to the Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee for examination and report, pursuant to resolution of the Assembly dated 27 February 2003.
I shall refer to the Power and Water Corporation by its business name, PowerWater, throughout the remainder of this statement.
Madam Speaker, as you and members are aware, the Government Owned Corporations Act came into operation on 21 December 2001, and PowerWater is the Territory’s first government owned corporation. Under section 39(7)(a) of the Government Owned Corporations Act, as shareholding minister for PowerWater, I must table in the Legislative Assembly a copy of the Statement of Corporate Intent for the government owned corporation.
The Statement of Corporate Intent is the annual performance agreement between the government owned corporation and myself, as shareholding minister on behalf of Territorians, as owners of PowerWater.
The first Statement of Corporate Intent for PowerWater was tabled in the Legislative Assembly on 15 August 2002 for the 2002-03 year. On 27 February 2003, I said in the Assembly that PowerWater had advised that it intended revising its Statement of Corporate Intent for 2002-03 to reflect developments such as PowerWater regaining 100% of the Territory’s electricity market following the departure of NT Power Generation Pty Ltd.
I indicated in February that I would table the revised Statement of Corporate Intent for 2002-03, and I have now tabled it. As members will recall, the former Treasurer stated in August 2002, when tabling the first Statement of Corporate Intent, that the Statements of Corporate Intent tabled in the Legislative Assembly understandably do not include commercially sensitive information. As noted also by the former Treasurer in August 2002, as the objective of making PowerWater a government owned corporation was to put PowerWater in a position as similar as possible to an equivalent private sector business, it would not be sensible to disadvantage PowerWater by making public commercially confidential information that no private sector business would release. This is still relevant, even though at this time PowerWater has no direct competitor in its market.
It is worth noting in this context that, as parts of PowerWater’s business constitute monopolies, the Utilities Commission’s function is to ensure that PowerWater does not take unfair advantage of their monopoly position to the detriment of customers.
Members will note that the revised 2002-03 Statement of Corporate Intent shows a $14m increase in nett profit of PowerWater from the originally forecast $26m to $40m. This improvement is mainly due to regaining 100% of the Territory’s electricity market. The increase in nett profit will mean that the government, as shareholder, will receive a higher dividend in the 2003-04 year.
As members are aware, there was considerable debate in the Legislative Assembly in February 2003 about the Estimates Committee process and the review of last year’s Estimates Committee process that was undertaken. One of the outcomes of the Estimates Committee review was that there would be a Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee formed. This Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee will examine the activities, performances, practises and financial management of PowerWater with reference to PowerWater’s Statement of Corporate Intent for 2003-04. I therefore tabled PowerWater’s Statement of Corporate Intent for 2003-04 so that it can be examined by the Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee.
Members will note that PowerWater forecast a nett profit after tax of $49m in 2003-04 and the Chairman of PowerWater will sit before the Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee on Friday 27 June to answer questions about the forecasts. I would reasonably expect, as I stated in February this year, that as well as answering questions about the forecasts, the Chairman of PowerWater could expect to answer questions about such things as the impact on PowerWater from the departure of NT Power Generation Pty Ltd from the Territory’s electricity market, and issues relating to the Amadeus Basin gas supply.
Members will note that in addition to the Government Owned Corporations Scrutiny Committee process, PowerWater will still be required to provide me, as shareholding minister, quarterly performance reports that explain PowerWater’s performance against the forecast contained in the Statement of Corporate Intent.
In closing, it is worth noting that PowerWater is still a very new government-owned corporation. As a result of this, the process that is used to develop the Statement of Corporate Intent to monitor PowerWater’s performance against it and to set targets for the corporation will be improved each year.
Motion agreed to.
APPROPRIATION BILL 2003-04
(Serial 147)
(Serial 147)
Continued from earlier this day.
Madam SPEAKER: The member for Karama has 10 minutes.
Ms LAWRIE (Karama): Madam Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to resume my remarks on the budget handed down by Treasurer.
In terms of the electorate of Karama I welcome the strategic initiatives in business. Specifically, I welcome the creation of an e-business integrated business service channel, the creation of a single web-based access point to provide information on relevant business assistance programs and services. We have a lot of small businesses operated by families in Karama and Malak, and these initiatives will go a long way to providing practical assistance to small business in our community.
The development and implementation of a manufacturing industry strategy will position the Northern Territory for oil and gas opportunities and is a very welcome initiative. Implementation of the International Trade Strategy is a terrific initiative in this budget providing a new program, the Trade Support Scheme, which will provide financial assistance to Territory exporters and trade firms. We are being very focussed about positioning Territory firms to make the most of what will be improved trade opportunities once the East Arm port and the railway link come on line and are fully operational.
Obviously, there will be other opportunities in terms of trade associated with the flow on of oil and gas opportunities. I congratulate the Minister for Business, Industry and Resource Development for ensuring that the budget positions the business community to take advantage of opportunities that will flow from these projects.
Continuation of the business case managers and short courses for businesses, initiatives from the previous financial year, which have already shown that they are successful in assisting business to operate better. The more assistance we can give to the small and medium businesses, the more effective they are, the more jobs we provide in the Territory and the economic returns to the Territory are tremendous. I thank the Cabinet for ensuring that this initiative continues.
There is a great deal of interest in my electorate about the $2m provision to upgrade and enhance public dwellings in urban centres. I will be commencing discussions immediately with the minister’s office about this initiative, of which I have been a strong advocate. We inherited public housing stock that is severely run down and money needs to go to the repairs and maintenance of that stock, as well as provision for new housing. We know there is a shortage of housing throughout the Territory. Repairs and maintenance provide a win-win-win opportunity. Private owners living in a street alongside a run down property would see the area aesthetically improved by repairs and maintenance to public housing, enhancing the resale value of their property.
It also provides stimulus to the sub-contractors, the workers in our community who carry out repairs and maintenance works, and, importantly, it provides the tenants of public housing with homes that are in a reasonable condition rather than run down. Urban renewal such as this has been proven to work in other jurisdictions, and I am a very strong advocate of these programs.
Other specific spending in this budget I welcome and recognise on behalf or my constituents include: $4m to provide ongoing security screening program for public housing. Karama is being screened at the moment and residents are absolutely delighted. For the first time in a long time, they are feeling safe and secure in their homes - and we are talking about people who are vulnerable: aged pensioners, people with disabilities, mothers, single mothers. I welcome the continuation of the security screening program and $4m identified to provide further screening.
I welcome $500 000 to upgrade visitor facilities at the Casuarina Coastal Reserve, to provide parking, lighting and improved access. Casuarina Coastal Reserve is a very beautiful part of the northern suburbs and people enjoy the recreational facilities there. The upgrade is overdue and extremely welcome, as is the upgrade to Buffalo Creek boat ramp and vehicle security improvements that were allocated $350 000 in this budget.
I want to touch on the government’s policy change in relation to mining. In his budget response, the Leader of the Opposition made a fleeting reference to the intended phasing out of Exploration Expenditure Certificates. The Leader of the Opposition said:
- The abolition of exploration expenditure certificates will hit small Territory businesses. It was an
incentive for mining and exploration companies to purchase their goods and services in the Northern
Territory from Territorians.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. Exploration expenditure certificates have nothing whatsoever to do with purchasing practices. They are a component of the royalty system, which allows for deduction in royalty payments based on prior exploration activity. The former Chief Minister was seemingly content to preside over a steadily declining exploration industry. Exploration licence grants prove this to be the case. There was a massive decline during the leadership of the Leader of the Opposition. It is clear that he has absolutely no understanding of how the scheme operated, what it was intended to achieve and, more importantly, how it was failing to stimulate exploration in the Northern Territory.
The value of exploration in the Northern Territory declined under the CLP government from over $90m in 1995-96 to less than $50m in 2000-01. This government has managed to arrest that drastic decline, but far from content with that success, we are determined to lift exploration to its rightful level. We believe that provision of some $3.8m will be a strong contributor to building the Territory’s resource base and it is being welcomed by the industry. The $3.8m will provide pre-exploration information, assisting access to land for mineral and petroleum exploration and production, critical elements in the pursuit of potential for the Territory.
Last, but by no means least, is the government’s provision of $730 000 to create and pursue environment policy development. The environment is an issue of concern to many Territorians, and it is important that funding is allocated to the development of clear, informed and progressive environment policy. I congratulate the minister for the environment on this budget allocation.
Mr MALEY (Goyder): Madam Speaker, I rise to place on the record my observations and comments on behalf of the electorate of Goyder in relation to the 2003-04 budget handed down by the Martin Labor government.
There is little or no doubt that the families of my electorate have been short changed. I agree with most of the comments by the member for Nelson. What has been provided for rural people in this budget is clearly not equitable nor fair. They deserve a lot more than what they received. My electorate has one of the highest rates of private employment and home ownership. There are very few housing commission-type facilities; you can count them on one hand. There are a couple of units at Humpty Doo. This area has one of the highest rates of home ownership in the Territory and, at one stage, it was the highest rate of private home ownership in Australia. These are hard working families who pay tax, they are real contributors to the community, many of whom are born in the Northern Territory, many are from long-term Territory families. Unlike some other areas of the Territory where there is effectively no private enterprise and everyone is, in one way or another, on the taxpayer nipple, my electorate is strong, independent, self-reliant, dominated by private enterprise and hard working people.
Those principles may be offensive and alien to those on the other side, and their political ideology in terms of their trade union and feel-good social background. The mentality of a union-dominated, socially divisive Labor Party is a choke around the neck of all decent working Territorians. Rural people received almost nothing from the budget when you compare it with how much they contribute to the community. Spending money in some remote communities is outrageous and unfair. People should be encouraged to pay their own way, and if they cannot get a job in a remote community, then in some situations they should be encouraged to travel to other places to find that job, just like hundreds of mine workers, graziers, ringers, fruit pickers, like many Territorians who have to travel to keep in employment. Some Territorians need a wake up call.
Of course, every civilised society needs balance, and you must look after those most in need, and that has been described as the measure of a civilised society, but an economic plan that creates a welfare-dependent community of healthy, able bodied people is abhorrent and disgraceful. It comes down to this: a government sends out the message that you are a bludger and that is okay; we will build a house for you; we will construct your fences; do not work; we will bleed the decent people of the Territory to subsidise your lifestyle. That sends out the wrong message.
Enough is enough. The rural area has about 17 000 - the member for Nelson used that figure and I think it is the most up to date – hard working people; real people with real jobs, real contributors and real taxpayers. However, rather than spending the money to build much needed infrastructure at Freds Pass, we have seen it frittered and wasted on non-wealth creating projects in other areas of the Northern Territory. Rural people do not want more than a fair share; they just want a fair share of the pie. It is no wonder that rural people – anyone with a job - are of the view that the Labor Party stinks, and that social do-gooders and no-hopers dominate the Labor government. In my view, the policies of the Labor government create and promote racism.
I have a vision for the rural area, and it really hinges from a sporting perspective, first of all at Freds Pass. Freds Pass is an enormous tract of land surrounded by the rural area. You have Palmerston just down the road. You have Weddell on the other side of the Elizabeth River at the bottom of Virginia. In the future, that should be the sporting hub for these three large population and tax paying bases. Freds Pass needs a sports stadium. That commitment needs to be given. It needs lights on the ovals. The Northern Territory Polocrosse Association must have lights on at least one of their ovals. They held the championships here the year before last. People came from all over Australia to see what we have, and Freds Pass is where they spent most of their time. These people bring a lot of money to the Territory. The championships went on for a number of days – almost a week - yet the government has seen fit to rob rural people of proper resources for Freds Pass, but rather send it off to some remote communities where, ultimately, on a per capita level, there has been no real contribution to the tax base.
Soccer is absolutely enormous and growing in the rural area. There is a large tract of land behind the Aussie Rules oval for which the plans are to make it the home ground of rural soccer. There are already numerous matches played at Freds Pass and that is destined to grow. My colleague, the member for Nelson, has close ties with and is a keen supporter of soccer. He tells me that soccer is going to be the sport of the future in rural area. I may not totally agree with that, but it certainly an important sport, one which the government should support by way of providing those important resources.
Credit where credit is due: the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure appeared on the front page of the Litchfield Times giving a large shed to the Freds Pass Reserve. It might have been given to the Litchfield Shire, but anyway, the plan is to set it up at Freds Pass. There is a significant cost in having that shed relocated to Freds Pass, with engineering specs and the like. Whilst there are not any firm figures, we are talking figures of between $300 000 and $400 000 to relocate this shed; a shed which would cost in the millions to build. Those type of projects for that little amount of money would service a large number of rural people and go some way to beginning to provide the important infrastructure which is required at Freds Pass.
Humpty Doo needs a pool. This is the much touted pool which was promised by the Labor candidates prior to the last election before they were slaughtered. The momentum for a pool continues to grow. There has been some negotiation between the Litchfield Shire Council and the government. In typical Labor form, they said: ‘Well, here is the money for the pool, but you guys run it’. Hang on. People live in the rural area so they are not regulated, so we do not pay exorbitant rates - the three Rs: roads, rubbish and recreation reserves. If the government is going to promise a pool, then it is not a situation of just plonking it on the ground and saying: ‘Take care of it’. You promised it. You operate it. That is your election promise. There is absolutely nothing in the budget for the pool.
The rural area needs one of two things: it needs a second high school or some real resources pumped into Taminmin High. The messages that have been sent out in the form of a review that there is talk about taking away Years 11 and 12 is disappointing. As a former Taminmin High student who spent four of his five senior years at Taminmin High, I cannot think of a better school in the Northern Territory to attend. It is not only a high school, there is a real sense of community. Perhaps I am a bit one-eyed, being born and bred up here and spending my whole life in the rural area, but rural kids are good kids. There is something about them that stands them apart from their counterparts in town. The idea of keeping them together right to Year 12, and not just to Year 10, has enormous merit.
In the electorate of Goyder, the boundaries change every election, so I am going to talk generally about ‘the rural area’. It really means all the blockies and the people who live from Palmerston out to Acacia, Dundee and the edge of Kakadu.
There are real infrastructure needs. As the population increases, there is a real need to begin extending a number of water grids along arterial roads. Already there are problems with bores, some drying up, but for a large proportion the water level drops as the year goes on, making it difficult for some rural people to water all of their paddocks or their lawns. Some have crops. They have to be very careful and they have to run the bores for a longer period of time, watering small sections of their property over the course of a day. They are expensive issues, and there is no getting away from that. If the government is really serious about creating jobs, creating employment and trying to get rid of this welfare mentality, handout mentality, then this is precisely the type of infrastructure could …
Ms Scrymgour: Substantiate ‘welfare mentality’.
Mr MALEY: What was that?
Ms Scrymgour: Substantiate what you were just saying. Do not just say it. Substantiate why you are saying it.
Mr MALEY: If the honourable member would listen, ‘welfare mentality’ is the type of mentality that says look I will sit down, I will get things given to me. There is not a real effort to get a job. Ultimately, if you really want to give a family a work ethic and give them a sense of self, you have to give people a job. You cannot say you are black, you are white, you are in between.
Ms Scrymgour: We are not saying that. We are not saying that.
Mr MALEY: People are people. That is what you are always saying.
Ms Scrymgour: And it is about jobs.
Mr MALEY: The Labor government …
Ms Scrymgour: No, it is not.
Mr MALEY: The Labor government is continually going on about indigenous and non-indigenous. My electorate has an enormous cross section and we do not put people in categories like the social do-gooders from that side, because people are people.
If you can get these small businesses - these businesses which employ two or three, maybe husband and wife team, and the wife might take care of the books and do all the accounts as well as look after a family, two jobs, and the other half perhaps running the small electrical business - to employ an apprentice or a tradesman, then that will have an enormous effect. It will create a sense of wealth and a sense of purpose for that tradesman or employee, and it is a private enterprise job so it is not someone who is on the welfare nipple.
The electorate of Goyder includes places like Mandorah, a unique place. It is really Cox Peninsula, but Mandorah, Wagait Beach, we have Belyuen or Delissaville, however you want to refer to it. There are a number of people there who every year encounter serious water shortages. There is a spring, but the spring dries up and we have people who live at both communities in genuine need of some real infrastructure to take that next step, to get that critical mass, and there is nothing in this budget for those good people.
Credit where credit is due: there are some indications of an upgrading and sealing of a small portion of the Cox Peninsula Road, I think it is six to 10 kilometres, but that still leaves between 10 and 14 kilometres of dirt road which is the only lifeline, the only arterial road between Mandorah, Belyuen and the larger shops in the rural area, Humpty Doo and Coolalinga and into town.
There is a need for a plan for some sort of stinger net. A safe swimming area needs to be investigated at Mandorah. There are a number of spots there, and it is a real jewel in the Territory. It is straight across the harbour. If there was a safe place for people to swim, particularly during the stinger season, then the numbers would increase. Every time I go there, I see new dwellings; people who have decided that they are going to make Mandorah or Wagait Beach their home. It is incumbent upon the government to do what they can to help facilitate some sort of business enterprise over there, and the planning for water is something that should be considered.
There needs to be an effort to make sure we maintain the beach and conservation zones at Wagait as well. I have a number of friends who live there. I have an enormous amount of time for one fellow. He and his wife used to live at Bees Creek and have recently moved to Mandorah; they love it; they say they should have done it earlier. He says that now is the time to get in with proper planning, and with proper investment there will be nothing holding Mandorah back.
In Dundee and the Bynoe Haven regions, these people are battlers; they are incredibly hard working people. There are some people living out there in some very difficult conditions. They don’t get any of this support. In fact, there are a couple of fellows out there who would be too embarrassed to put their hand out to receive welfare. His wife described him as stubborn, but he is such a decent Territorian; he refuses to be on the taxpayer’s nipple. He is out there working really hard, setting up his mangoes. He is a battler, precisely the type of person that we should be supporting.
From a primary industries perspective, which is part of my shadow portfolio, there are big plans for larger mango and pineapple plantations, but they are all depending upon the upgrading of the road to an all-weather sealed road. I know it is an election promise and there are two years to go, but there is a promise to seal the road and extend the power grid to Dundee. This is not a small project. It might be about 40 kilometres – there are a couple of tarred patches in the middle of Fogg Bay Road, I think one is 12 kilometre and one is about 10 kilometres, so it leaves about 40-odd kilometres of dirt road. That road has to be upgraded. The power has to go in. Then you will see these primary production oriented industry people go into overdrive. The expectation has been created. We have letters from the minister. There were representations made in a number of pamphlets prior to the election that this was going to occur, but there is absolutely nothing in this budget for the introduction of power and the extension of the grid to the Dundee region.
There are a number of huge developments - one is a resort, and he is waiting upon this infrastructure. When that occurs, there will be real expenditure of private enterprise money, the development of the resort and, of course, jobs. This hasn’t occurred and so we are looking at least another year down the track before there is some real development in that portion of the rural area at Dundee of this large and impressive resort facility.
There are other problems in relation to water and the salinity of wells which will have to be addressed, but there is nothing in this budget to deal with that, either.
Estimates is, of course, coming up and we will have a chance then to drill down into our respective portfolios and ask the questions on behalf Territorians about those topics, but just in general in respect of primary industries, I am concerned that if there was a Budget Cabinet, then the new Minister for Primary Industries cannot have been there because there has been a fairly significant cut. Portions of the budget have been slashed and burned. If you look at page 145 of Budget Paper No 3, we have cuts to areas such as the capacity to conduct animal health and plant surveillance and diagnostic services, including laboratories. It seems there are cuts to the capacity to provide and maintain research facilities throughout the Territory, that is the research farms. There is a global cut of about $4.4m.
The horticultural industry, primary industries and fisheries have huge potential. I have heard, to his credit, the minister accept there is an enormous amount of potential, but I am firmly of the view that this will be one of the biggest employers in the Northern Territory in the not too distant future.
Dr Burns: There has been no $4.3m cut.
Mr MALEY: Well, that is what the budget papers seem say.
I know tourism employs lots of people and it did not receive the attention it deserves, either. However, from a primary industries perspective, this a crucial time. This is a time where we really should be investing in the future of this potentially enormous industry.
The minister did, in his supportive speech of the Treasurer, make passing reference to fisheries development and, to his credit the NTU or the Charles Darwin University, CSIRO and the partnerships and workshops, some good ideas there. There was a passing reference to the cut flower industry and the mango growers but, what is of concern is what the minister did not say.
There was no reference at all, as far as I can recall, to the Northern Territory Horticultural Association, the peak body that represents an enormous cross-section of people who are heavily involved in the horticultural industry. There was a reference to cattle, but there was no time or effort spent on the export of beef cattle, the Camel Association, as opposed to cattle, or what is happening with the Brahman Breeders. There are lots of topics that could have been properly explained. The minister should have been proud to say this is what we are doing for these people because we believe in them. Instead, there is a scant, supportive response from the minister in relation to those topics.
As I say, now is probably not the time to drill down into the nitty gritty and there is still plenty of work to be done. During the estimates I am sure we will be able to put ourselves in a better position to understand where these cuts are and the rationale behind them.
It is lucky nobody listens to what the government says in parliament, because if they did, they would soon realise that most of it is bluff and bluster. I am becoming used to it; you switch off. It seems that if anyone really believes for a second that the six point plan the government has to reduce crime will have any effect, they are delusional. People are starting to realise that the incidence of crime is a complicated issue and one which, unfortunately, is strictly related to economic activity, to people having jobs, to families and to promoting self-esteem and self-worth in people. If you have 2000 people living anywhere, and there is not one real job, then of course there are going to be problems. If you do not have a mum and dad who have a work ethic and are not required to set the example and go to work, then how can you possibly expect, with all the social programs in the world, to make a difference?
There has been a decrease in economic activity because this government has not delivered any new initiatives. There has been a decrease in population in the Northern Territory, and that is the result of the failure to deliver. Yet everyone knows there has been an increase in crime, in antisocial behaviour, and in the number of itinerants you see flocking into town. There was a suggestion that money to fly itinerants home would only assist them in making it financially viable for them to make twice as many visits because they are only have to pay one way. We are yet to see results of this initiative.
The increase in crime means more people will be processed through the courts. Now we are left in the embarrassing position where people on remand have been put in to the general prison population. People on remand are people against whom the allegation has been made and is yet to be proved. They are presumed to be innocent. That is something you would think the Attorney-General would understand, given the gauntlet he recently ran. At the end of that process, people might be found to be innocent, or discharged or the charge withdrawn, and they are released. You should not have those people spending time with criminals who have been convicted beyond reasonable doubt of committing serious offences. You do not want people who are on remand spending time with murderers and rapists. People on remand are there for all types of reasons, but one thing is for sure: they are entitled to the presumption of innocence. There is the presumption that they have done absolutely nothing until they are convicted. All the minister could give in time to this important topic is one of those pathetic ministerial statements they read out like parrots and then big-note themselves while the opposition has to make and instantaneous response. Then, of course, they wrap up with another poorly-worded comment.
There is nothing in this budget to demonstrate there will be more resources given to Corrections. There is nothing in this budget to say: ‘Okay, we are going to make sure that, whilst the Labor government spirals the Territory into this economic inactivity, through no initiative, then there will be further offending. We had better make plans to make sure that the remand section is larger’. There is absolutely nothing to that effect. Instead, and on the contrary, we have a government which has been talking tough and trying to sell to families in the Territory that they are doing something. The truth is they are not. They are, in fact, abusing the trust Territory people gave to them on the 18 August 2001. If you look at the initiatives from the Department of Justice’s perspective - which includes Corrections - at page 94 of Budget Paper No 3, these are the budget highlights. They have been talking tough with what they are doing. We have an economic downturn; more people commit offences - of course, the remand section is absolutely full; there are more people in prison. This is what they have done:
- Funding of $0.52m has been provided to the Integrated Offender Management Program initiative
relating to the reintegration of released prisoners within the Correctional Services output group.
Their response is to put more money into trying to get prisoners out, and trying to get them out earlier. We have heard some announcements about trialling security bands, and references to home detention. It sounds like this is a government doing all it can to make sure that people are not incarcerated. They are not trying to deal with the problem; they are trying to get people out. This is a budget highlight for this particular area:
- Two new positions are being established to facilitate indigenous input into crime prevention strategies
across the agency as part of the government’s law and justice strategy.
Well, that is going to make a massive difference - not! The other one:
- Funding of $0.15m is provided in 2003-04 to continue trialling the Community Justice/ Mediation Centre.
Well, that is interesting. I am not sure how that can be reflected as an initiative and getting tough on crime.
We have the cost per solicitor hour at page 96 of Budget Paper No 3. Remember, we have just had the raft of tort law reform and law society law reform packages. The cost per solicitor hour for the Department of Justice is $161 per hour - that is for a government lawyer and to get advice on legal matters. Yet, as a result of the amendments to the tort law reform package, they have reduced the maximum amount payable to a solicitor for a claim of less than $15 000 to $36 an hour. So, the average punter cannot get a solicitor, but the government has the right to do what they want.
Members interjecting.
Mr MALEY: I will have to save the rest of my comments for the Estimates Committee. However, Madam Speaker, I have decided, after much thinking and reading and listening to what the minister has to say, that this budget can be called the Milli Vanilli Budget. It is false, it is miming, it is not doing anything. This is the Milli Vanilli budget. It is not genuine, and the people of the Territory will soon realise that you can Milli Vanilli all you want, but at the end of the day it is not going to make any difference.
Mr BONSON (Millner): Madam Speaker, I rise today to contribute to the budget 2003-04 debate. The importance of the Northern Territory budget cannot be underestimated or devalued. It is the single most important achievement of any Territory government and it outlines a blueprint for our community, towns, cities and the Territory as a whole. It should be remembered that a budget has several important roles, one of which is the approval of expenditure of public funds in a lawful manner for the benefit of the public interest.
The public interest, in this case, means many things. It means the economy, business, health, education, employment, jobs, social harmony, youth, seniors, families, police, law enforcement, mining, tourism – and the list goes on. The budget for 2003-04 does a fantastic job for all Territorians in delivering for young and old, male and female, rich and poor, black, white, green or purple, and whatever their background. The Territory government has delivered again.
As a member of parliament, and particularly as a member of government, I believe it is my duty to fight for all Territorians. I believe this budget is a great example of our ability to deliver to the community resources that they need, when and where they need them. In this booklet, Budget Overview: Budget 2003-04, …
Mr Dunham: Have you read it? It’s a rip-snorter.
Mr BONSON: … we talk about responsible finances, of course …
Dr Burns: Don’t let them put you off your game.
Mr BONSON: They will never put me off my game. They underestimate the mental toughness of this individual.
Members interjecting.
Mr BONSON: … for example, further tax cuts. The $90 Temporary Budget Improvement Levy ceases on 1 July 2003, 18 months early. As we all know, the history of this levy was to cover the deficit left by the former government. There is a further reduction in payroll tax rates from 6.3% to 6.2%. The abolition of stamp duty on commercial leases and franchises with annual rent below than $30 000 will benefit 450 businesses. No new taxes in this budget – fantastic!
Building Territory business: $434m total infrastructure expenditure; a record $27m for tourism, including a $1.5m boost to marketing. The present tourism minister is probably the most intelligent and hardworking tourism minister that the Territory has ever seen, and he comes under constant attack from the opposition. I am amazed that they don’t tire of being hit over the fence for six, as he constantly comes back and derails and humiliates them in this House.
One of the things of particular interest in the budget highlights is the $1.5m additional funding for the Charles Darwin University, improving teacher training and research, particularly gas and energy. As you may or may not be aware, I am a graduate of the Northern Territory University and received a fantastic education from that institution. I understand there are other members who have graduated from that institution. I hope that no one in this House talks down that fabulous institution and what it provides.
I would also like to mention promoting jobs and training, the $74.5m for employment and vocational education and training; $1.5m extra for more apprentices, a total of $11.2m. As mentioned by both sides of this House, employment is probably the single most important initiative any government can give their community. Employment means income, economic independence and development; $0.5m for a new employment bonus scheme for employers.
Safer Territory communities – a record police budget of $146m - and later I will refer to the media release issued by the President of the Police Association, Vince Kelly - $5.25m for a Territory-wide Itinerant Strategy to combat the antisocial behaviour, and I will expand on that in a little while because I think that is a fantastic initiative and it is the first time any government has taken a serious step towards dealing with issues surrounding poverty and antisocial behaviour in our community.
$1.6m additional in 2003-04 for more police and fire officers, a total increase of $4.9m to date as part of the government’s commitment to an extra 50 police and 16 fire officers over its first term. As people may or may not be aware, my family has a long history in the fire department in the Northern Territory. My father was a firie for over 20 years, and I have two uncles still employed as firies, and no doubt that they will welcome 16 new officers. I have many friends in that service, and they do a fantastic job raising money for the seniors. They joke amongst themselves. They call themselves ‘the City’s Finest’ and there is not much argument there.
$3m to fill the funding gap for police personnel costs including technical and administrative support. I will expand on that later. $1.42m to construct a Police, Fire and Emergency Services facility at Humpty Doo. One of the things about being in government and being representative of all Territorians is that you have to put resources outside your electorates. Members will always argue for their electorate - that is their duty, role and responsibility - but I think it is a sign of great maturity from the Northern Territory government to provide services to every member of our community, whether they live at Humpty Doo, Alice Springs, Tennant Creek etcetera, it does not matter. I have a genuine interest in the development of all facets of Territory life, no matter what community.
There is $2.36m for the Office of Crime Prevention to tackle the causes of crime. This has been a fantastic initiative, and the Minister for Central Australia has worked tirelessly over the last 18 months or more to make sure that this project works, and it is delivering its purpose. $0.4m for community based crime prevention initiatives. Also under the budget highlights, better schools. A record education and training budget of $520m. I repeat that: a record education and training budget of $520m – in black and white. We have constantly heard the whining, harping, whingeing bemoaning the fact that we are not doing anything for Territory families. There it is, in black and white for people to read: a record education and training budget of $520m.
There is $22.1m for new and upgraded school facilities in urban and remote areas; an extra $3m for improved information technology in schools; $2m additional in 2003-04 for more teachers. As members may be aware, my partner is a teacher, and a couple of my family members are teachers and have a long history in education in the Northern Territory. They are very happy about this increase.
The government is committed to 100 extra teachers over its first term, and I would really love to see local Territorians, men and women, take up the opportunity to educate other Territorians about the lifestyle and benefit of receiving an education because I believe as well as employment, that is probably the second most important initiative any government can give people: an education. $6.3m extra for teachers and pay conditions. Obviously, that speaks for itself and many teachers round the Territory are quite happy with that. $0.43m to reduce truancy and behavioural problems.
I attended a function on Sunday called the Sorry Day function. I often get on radio, on 94.5 Larrakia Radio and speak about the importance of people – black, white, green or purple - sending their kids to school and improving them and giving them that opportunity to go to school. I was approached by a mother who said to me: ‘Look, I often hear you on radio talking about the importance of going to school. I need assistance with getting my children to come to school’. Then here comes this little eight, nine year old kid, butter would not melt in his mouth, one of the cutest little kids you would ever see in the world, and he is sitting there in front of me listening to us talking about him going to school. One of the things I said to him was: ‘How come you are not going to school?’, and he said: ‘I do not get assistance’. This $0.43m to reduce truancy and behaviour problems - we are dealing with eight, nine, ten year old kids, I would have said he was - is a start. I will be pushing for more in the future and I believe it is going to be a great benefit and a winner with the community.
$0.46m extra for students with learning disabilities; $0.3m for a pilot school breakfast program for remote areas to improve students’ concentration and attendance at school. This is fantastic. White, black, green or purple, it does not matter, if you go to work, you go to school as an adult or child and you have not had something to eat in the morning, you are distracted. It is very important that, through these breakfast programs, parents as well are encouraged to take responsibility for feeding their children and food is provided. I will give you an example. There is a breakfast program that just started at the Bagot community through Commonwealth funding. The minister visited, and what they found is a marked improvement on attendance rates and performances of children. We talk about associated behaviour problems with kids at school, or not getting the right education, or not working. As a society, surely we can provide one meal a day, guaranteed, to assist them to get educated in the right manner, where we do not have behavioural problems develop because people cannot learn at school. This should be supported by the opposition. I am sure that when they have time to think about it, they will support it.
Improving health: a record health budget of $561m. Again, in black and white: improving health, a record health budget of $561m. As everyone would know, health issues all around Australia, the world and in particular, the Northern Territory to such a large extent deserve recognition. There are many debates around the world now, particularly in Western European countries, about the amount of funds that should be spent on health. I am proud to say we cannot do anything more than spend a record health budget of $561m. I am sure all health professionals would argue for more, and there is no doubt that the minister is fighting tooth and nail to get recognition for problems surrounding health. $3.6m for the new emergency department at Royal Darwin Hospital. Fantastic. I think everyone including, in particular, the constituents of Millner will be very happy that they can go to a new Royal Darwin Hospital and get treatment. This goes for all the Northern suburbs. This is, again, an approach by the whole of government to represent all Territorians. $1.57m additional in 2003-04 for more nurses, a total increase of $3.9m to date as part of the government’s commitment to extra nurses over its first term.
As many people in this House might or might not know, I have had family members in this profession. My late grandmother was a nurse, and I have many friends who are nurses at the moment, and no doubt they work very, very hard to earn their dollar, but there is no doubt also that they put in a lot of extra time because they believe in what they are doing. Their value as employees of either the Northern Territory government or private hospitals should be increased. This is fantastic to increase this funding to increase the number of nurses and I am sure members on both sides of the House will agree with this. $0.9m to increase mental health services across the Territory. This is a big issue for the community. I was amazed, as a first time elected member, within the first 12 months, how often I was approached by people in the health profession talking about mental health issues.
Mental health is a very important issue for all Territorians to face. Anyone who has family members, friends or associates, or community members with mental health problems, will know it is a very difficult matter to deal with. However, it has to be dealt with because, unfortunately, there are a lot of things that flow from mental illness. As the Health minister said, the government inherited a health system that was left to deteriorate to a state where it fails to meet the needs of clients, s under-resourced and poorly supported. She continued:
- In 2003-04, $900 000 will be used to boost the current forensic mental health service and strengthen
child and adolescent mental health services and services for remote and regional areas.
She continued:
- Over the next three years there will be an injection of $7.2m into the mental health sector with funding
of a further $2.5m in 2004-05, and $3.9m in 2005-06.
This is fantastic for people in the mental health field who can see this is the money projected. One of the big issues, of course, was the number of men who are working in the health field. I do not want to bring up the gender argument but, obviously, people have approach me saying that many men - black, white, green, purple; it does not matter, whatever ethnic group - are suffering out there. A lot of men are perpetrating domestic and family violence, and a lot of it relates back to mental illness.
This was presented to me by several people, and I went to the Health minister and spoke to her on several occasions about the importance of mental health in our community, and the importance of prevention rather than cure. We certainly need a cure and a way for people to rehabilitate their health, but preventing it has to be better than cure. This expenditure of monies on mental health field is fantastic, and I welcome it.
She goes on to say it is the most significant increase in mental health funding for a number of years:
- This additional funding will also be allocated to advanced clinical mental health services and strengthen
consumer and carer support services provided by non-government agencies. Specific initiatives include
specialist child and youth mental health services, Aboriginal mental health coordinators, mental health
nurses, enhancement to forensic mental health services, and funding for consumer and carer support
services provided by non-government organisations.
We have a problem on the child and youth side of things. Due to substance and family abuse, there are a lot of children out there suffering mental health problems. I will be watching keenly to see the progress of that. Regarding Aboriginal mental health, again, it is very difficult for people to receive proper health care in remote areas. I will be very interested in the outcomes of that investment into our community, because that is what it is: an investment in our community.
I continue now with $0.4m for upgrade of Territory-wide dental services. Obviously, this is a fundamental right that every Australian citizen takes for granted. Again, whether you are black, white, green or purple, irrespective of your cultural background, this is a service that you, as an Australian, expect. That is a fantastic initiative.
There is $0.3m for the telephone health advice and referral system; $0.5m for greater after-hours child protection services. I had the opportunity to talk to people in that field on Sunday, and this is a fantastic initiative. I will definitely expanding on that in a little while.
I would also like to mention the importance of the further tax cuts, and go into more detail. We know that the Temporary Budget Improvement Levy has not been popular in the wider community; the Territory government accepts that. We had to make a tough decision, and it was a decision we did not want to take. It was a decision we took a lot of heat over, and it was a decision that the opposition tried to take advantage of, instead of recognising where the fault came from. This will be of importance to young families, lower income families, middle class, upper income families, and also small business. This is fantastic.
The payroll tax initiative, the decrease from 6.3% to 6.2%, is a step in the right direction and I will be pushing that we continue its decrease. Stamp duty: I found this very interesting, in particular the so-called land rich stamp duty that the opposition tried to ramp up in the last few days. The government has introduced measures to ensure that large businesses pay stamp duty on property purchases on the same basis as householders. The change to land rich stamp duty applies from 27 May. This change will bring about greater equity in the system by removing the advantage that many larger businesses have enjoyed in the past where they have been able to indirectly acquire high value land through companies and pay substantially less stamp duty than someone who is buying their home.
This question was posed at the Chamber of Commerce lunch, and the Treasurer answered it well. What he brought it down to was the issue of equity. Why should someone buying a house between $180 000-$220 000 pay $8000, $9000, $10 000 worth of stamp duty while someone who can purchase a property for $15m pays $480, I think the figure was quoted, I am not quite sure. The thing about this is there has to be an equity component to this issue. Of course, we would like to wave a magic wand and remove stamp duty all together, but to provide all the health services and education services and other things that we as community rely on from the Northern Territory and the Commonwealth governments, we rely on taxes.
I would like to briefly deal with initiatives related to the Itinerant Strategy, an issue that has come to the forefront of recent politics but obviously an issue that has been around for a long time and I think that both sides of the House would recognise this. There is no one to blame; it is a reality of living in the Territory. It is not race-based; it is a poverty-based issue. You can walk into soup kitchens or places where people who live rough or are homeless seek assistance, and you might have 1000 people being served in Sydney, and I can guarantee you 95% of them are not Aboriginal.
The issue is about population density and the generics of the population mass. It so happens that in the Northern Territory, 28% of the population is of Aboriginal background. I am not laying blame on any one government; we can all maturely accept as a nation that historically, things have occurred resulting in Aboriginal people, on the whole, living a poverty-based existence. It is an affront to all Australians, and no one would like to see that change more than myself. I think most people agree on that.
The member for Arnhem spoke about the initiatives introduced to date. They include the Community Day Patrol launched in December 2002. This patrol is operating very successfully and will be upgraded in the coming financial year to improve the regularity of the service and the number of vehicles on patrol. Obviously, people are using this number. As a local member, I am giving out this number, as I am sure are other members. It is a great initiative. This is one of the things that the opposition and Independent members should really get behind because we can properly claim credit for moving in a positive way on this issue and, working together as members of parliament, we should be given credit for that.
The sobering up shelter: hours of operation have been extended to 24 hours on a needs basis. That is fantastic. An information and referrals office commenced operation at Centrelink Casuarina in December 2002 and has been averaging approximately 30 identity applications per day. This one-stop shop also provides a network of opportunities to encourage people away from a homeless lifestyle and substance abuse.
Larrakia Hosts commenced operations in April 2003 and will operate in markets and shopping centres throughout 2003-04. I am not Larrakia background myself, however, I know many of the Larrakia people and they are finding a difficulty in handling this problem by themselves and they are getting great support from the Northern Territory government. They have been working very hard to deal with this issue.
As we said, a record police budget of $146m. I repeat: a record police budget of $146m. $1.4m additional in 2003-04 for extra police, a total increase of $3.9m to date as part of the government’s commitment to recruit 50 more police officers over the four years. I encourage all young Territorians to consider a career here; the more locals we have in that service, the better.
There is $3m to fill the funding gap for police personnel costs including technical and administrative support; $1.4m for construction of the new police; $0.3m for stage 2 of the Mounted Police patrol facility at the Peter McAulay Centre. This is a great initiative: $1.5m for ongoing enhancement of the Police Real Time Online Management Information System, PROMIS. Obviously, there have been technical problems in the past, and this was mentioned in a media release by the President of the Police Association, Vince Kelly. He said:
- The Northern Territory Police Association has welcomed the funding commitments announced in today’s
budget.
Police Association President Vince Kelly said $1.5m committed to enhancing the PROMIS computer system
is a step in the right direction.
‘Our members have repeatedly identified problems with this system and, by extension, the service we deliver
to the public.
‘Hopefully, for both the police and the public, this money will improve the system.
‘We also welcome the $3m to properly fund civilian police positions. What this will mean is that the
operational budget can be spent on operations’.
That cannot be underestimated. It is fantastic.
- ‘The $250 000 allocated to upgrade the Ali Curung Police Station is long overdue.
- ‘On a recent visit there, I saw first-hand how run down this police station is. I urge the government to
fast-track this money.
‘While we welcome the spending commitments announced today, the real test for the government lies
ahead when the O’Sullivan Report on police resources is complete.’
‘Our members have painted a clear picture for Mr O’Sullivan and his team about the reality of police
numbers, particularly in operation and uniforms.
‘Frankly, I doubt the current recruiting has or will cover the attrition and promised increase of 50 police
officers over four years, nor do I believe 50 will be enough
‘A significant investment in police is required and there must be some attempt to reduce the attrition rate,
otherwise a staffing crisis like that experienced in the early 1990s is just around the corner,’ he said.
Obviously, in the early 1990s, the Martin government was not in power, but past governments were. There is no doubt a challenge there for the police minister to deal with this.
As a community, we all grow to respect the duties, roles and responsibilities of the police. We want the best trained personnel in these positions. The operation of police out in the community is one of the foundations of creating a safe community.
On safe communities, we have $2.36m to the Office of Crime Prevention, $0.4m for the community based crime prevention initiatives; $110 000 to Neighbourhood Watch programs. I am sure we will be working to increase that in future years; recurrent funding of $110 000 has been provided to Neighbourhood Watch programs to enable more community based initiatives to be undertaken to reduce crime. This funding will add a Neighbourhood Watch Board of Management to assist with staff development, advertising and promotion of Neighbourhood Watch programs, publication of Neighbourhood Watch member handbooks and replacement of Neighbourhood Watch street signage. Fantastic!
$0.52m for the Integrated Offender Management Program for reintegration programs for released prisoners. One of the big issues is families that have people released, getting back into the community, and working with the community. This is important.
Madam Speaker, I could talk on and on about the positives of this. The allocation for education and government schools is a fantastic initiative. I could go on, but I encourage all people who read the budget debate to have a look at the budget overview and books to see what a positive job we are doing. We are talking about futures, not the past. We are talking about creating better and safer communities.
Ms CARTER (Port Darwin): Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, the Department of Health and Community Services has had a difficult year, to say the very least. The cause of that difficulty has been their minister, the member for Nightcliff, and her inability to manage a budget.
Since becoming Minister for Health and Community Services, this minister has received tens of millions of dollars in extra funding to bail her out of trouble. She has had a major restructure of management positions in her department, and the end result is a budget blown by $20m and service cuts left, right and centre. These have included the cancellation of elective surgery at our major hospitals, and the mothballing of the newly built A and E centre at Royal Darwin Hospital. Staff have suffered. Management was instructed that coming in on budget was to be a key aim of theirs. They were to take strict measures to ensure this. As a consequence, we saw a freeze on recruitment. When contracts came up for renewal, they weren’t. Staff left. Positions sat empty. Those left in jobs had to work harder to cover the empty positions. This is putting incredible strain on the staff left behind.
An example of this is the Alice Springs Hospital Pharmacy, which, I am told, has been as much as 40% understaffed this year. The non-renewal of contracts certainly has not helped there. Another crude cost-cutting measure was the cutting, or curtailing, of elective surgery. The minister played semantics over this by coming up with new categories, but the end result was the same: elective surgery was delayed. I am told that this was done in Alice Springs because they did not have enough theatre staff, and that in Darwin it was done to cut costs. Many Territorians would have been disappointed by this move by the minister.
However, one of the most offensive cost-cutting measures I have seen this year was the demand made on nurses to fill a roster to provide a SARS response at Darwin Airport for incoming flights from Asia. These nurses are expected to get out of bed in the middle of the night to meet flights. Their reward: time off in lieu. Thank you, minister!. I hope the SARS problem ends before the goodwill of the nurses does. Despite these problems, staff have continued to provide quality care to the best of their ability. This was demonstrated so very well by the way the staff of Royal Darwin Hospital rose to the challenge when caring for the victims of the Bali bombings. On behalf of Territorians, I thank the staff of the department from across the Territory for the professional way they have dealt with the past difficult year.
In light of the current condition of the Department of Health and Community Services, it is timely to recall the minister’s opening comments to her budget speech last year. The minister said:
- It is visionary, progressive, fair and, above all, delivers on the commitment this government has made to
the people of the Northern Territory.
That begs the question: What went wrong? The health service has been in crisis for months, and what does the next financial year hold for the Department of Health and Community Services? Not much! Not much, except for some clever manipulation of numbers, the classic being the Treasurer’s and the minister’s crowing about an increase of $14.2m for this year. $14.2m. Big deal! To my mind, $14m added on to the previous year of approximately $547m is about a 2.5% increase. That is the rate of inflation! So, in purchasing power, it equals zero extra. Here is a coincidence: on page 282 of Budget Paper No 3, we learn that the Commonwealth government has been credited with providing an extra $13.6m for the coming health budget.
This is the Australian Health Care Agreement, an agreement which has not been signed off yet, but apparently the minister is going to sign, and is going to sign up for the max. Well, good on her. The minister and Treasurer claim to have increased spending on health by $14.2m; that is, they will add it in to cover inflation. However, they did not really provide that; the Commonwealth did that for us with their $13.6m. On behalf of Territorians, minister, thanks for nothing. The budget has increased by $14m and the Commonwealth provides $13m of it. It is a bit rich for the Martin Labor government to crow about it. It is even more rich when you understand this so-called increase just covers CPI; there is no extra real money.
Treasurer, you and your mates should come clean with Territorians and admit there is nothing extra that can be purchased with this money. In fact, my concern now is: where are the cuts to be made?
During Question Time yesterday, I referred to an e-mail message from the acting CEO of the Department of Health and Community Services, Dr David Ashbridge, which was sent out to his staff two days ago. In it, he described the new Health budget as ‘tough’ and warned staff there will be a need to ‘disinvest in programs’. Yesterday, during Question Time, I asked the Minister for Health and Community Services which programs would be cut - or should I say ‘disinvested’ - and she refused to answer. She filibustered, but refused to admit there would be cuts to programs. Indeed, in a question to the Treasurer earlier during the same Question Time, the Treasurer assured Territorians that no health and community service programs would be cut. Then, when I put Dr Ashbridge’s comments to the minister for Health - particularly the word ‘disinvest’ - she refused to provide any detail or acknowledge that this would happen.
Then, just an hour or so later during her response to the budget, the minister read:
- … there would be a need to disinvest in programs in line with government priorities.
The very word used the day before by her Acting CEO. Perhaps he wrote her speech. Therefore, I ask again : which programs …
Mrs AAGAARD: A point of order, Madam Acting Deputy Speaker! I believe that the member is, in fact, misquoting me. I talked about invest and disinvest.
Madam ACTING DEPUTY SPEAKER: Minister, there is no point of order. You can make a personal explanation later if you wish.
Mrs AAGAARD: I think perhaps the member needs to make a personal explanation, not me.
Madam ACTING DEPUTY SPEAKER: There is no point of order. I have ruled.
Ms CARTER: I ask again: which programs are to be cut? The reality is that in light of no real increase in the budget spending capacity, but with a range of additional spending initiatives such as: $3.6m for the new emergency department, ICU and operating theatres at Royal Darwin Hospital; $0.9m extra for mental health; $0.4m extra for dental; $0.35m extra for renal; $0.5m extra for child protection; $0.3m extra for school feeding programs; and $0.3m extra for a health call centre, we have a total of $6.35m extra. This money has to be found from current funding. So more than $6m worth of program services must be cut, and who knows what they will be? Certainly not Territorians.
The Acting CEO described in yesterday’s e-mail that the Health budget is tough, and he is right. Given the ministers inability to control spending, I predict a tough year ahead for her department. Given that during this financial year, she has blown her budget by $20m, I predict that within six months she will be well on her way to blow the new budget and, as a consequence, we will see a return to service cuts like the closure of operating theatres. It is easy to see that the minister did blown her budget by $20m by looking at page 196 of Budget Paper No 3 which shows her estimated budget for this financial year is $546.8m. If you go back to Budget Paper No 3 for August last year, page 203, you can see the minister was given $526m. Between the two books provided 10 months apart, we see the Minister for Health and Community Services received an extra $20m to bail her out of her budget blow-out.
So you can see, Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, why I had no confidence that the current minister will be able to deliver health and community services without going way over budget, an action which will kick start more draconian cost cutting measures as we have witnessed this financial year.
Madam ACTING DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Port Darwin, I will just interrupt for a moment. Member for Drysdale, I draw your attention to Standing Order 46, which requires every member to make obeisance to the Chair when passing to or from his seat and on entering and leaving the Chamber. You constantly ignore that standing order, and I request that you comply with it.
Mr Dunham: No problem.
Ms CARTER: Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, another disappointing factor about the 2003-04 health budget is the fact that so many of the capital works projects for the department which were meant to be commenced during the current financial year were not. As a result, these have been rolled over into the new budget. They include upgrading the health centre at Yuendumu; upgrading the airconditioning at Alice Springs Hospital; building a new health centre at Milikapiti; building a hospice, finishing the new A and E, building a new incinerator and boiler at Royal Darwin Hospital; and building a renal unit at Tennant Creek Hospital. The total cost of these re-voted works is $9.2m. These projects were warmly welcomed by Territorians when they were announced 10 months ago, particularly the hospice. Here is hoping we will see more action on that this year, and for a result that the community members who are involved with this project are happy with.
One of the most startling aspects of the Health and Community Services budget has been the transfer of funds from public health to acute hospital care services. To demonstrate this, you need to go to page 196 of Budget Paper No 3 for the year 2003-04, then pencil in the funding allocated in Budget Paper No 3 at page 203 for the current budget, that is the year 2002-03. By doing this, you will see that for the year 2002-03, acute services, which covers hospitals, was initially allocated $272m. In the new budget, it is estimated they will get $306m to cover their costs for this year, 2002-03, and for the next financial year 2003-04, they have been increased $14m to $320m. Acute care has had a significant increase in funds during the past 10 months, an increase of $48m. What is interesting is that despite this vast increase in funding, there is no expectation that their performance will increase as detailed on page 197 of Budget Paper No 3, which shows the WIES separations going from 42 847 separations to 43 000, an increase of only 153 separations despite increased funding of $14m. Extraordinary!
What about public health? Public health concentrates on providing strategies to help people live a healthier lifestyle to prevent disease, to reduce the number of people who have developed diseases and conditions needing expensive hospital care. Public health activities include environmental health, which includes sanitation and waste management; food safety, radiation health and poisons control; disease control, which includes disease prevention through early interventions, immunisations, screening, contact tracings and mosquito control; health promotion, which works to help people choose healthy behaviours; and alcohol and other drug services, with which I am sure members are familiar.
How has public health fared over the past 12 months? If you conduct the same exercise as described before, using Budget Papers No 3 from 2002-03 and 2003-04, you will see that for the year 2002-03, public health was allocated $39.8m of which it is estimated they will spend $35.4m. For the financial year 2003-04, they have received only $34.9m, a decrease of $5m in 10 months. What is interesting is that most of that decrease occurred this financial year, from the time the budget was allocated in August last year until the end of next month. What has happened is that the money allocated has been clawed back. This is the budget that should have paid the SARS airport screening nurses, but instead, they do not get paid. It is also the budget which is not going to pay for a needle syringe exchange program in Alice Springs, which only needed $110 000.
Another line in the health budget to suffer a major cut is Community Health. Using the same method I have just detailed, Community Health was allocated $109.6m last August. Due, no doubt, to the budget cuts introduced after the Bansemer Review in February this year, it is estimated that Community Health will be allowed to spend only $98.9m by the end of June. Lo! And Behold, in the budget for the next financial year, they have been cut even further to $98m.
How on earth the Treasurer and this Health minister can justify cutting Community Health by $10m in less than a year is beyond me. Community Health is a vital program which provides health education and development, prevention, early intervention, assessments, treatment and support services through activities like Community Health Centres in both our urban and remote communities, allied health services, school screening, dental, nutrition, breast and cervical cancer screening. Shame on this Labor government for this cut. You could tell the minister is not interested in this area; it didn’t even rate a mention in her budget response speech yesterday.
We see graphically that increased money and emphasis is to go into acute clinical services while resources for the prevention of illness, injury and disease is cut. What the Martin Labor government has chosen to do in this budget to reduce funding for community health and public health by $15m while bumping up hospital spending by $48m flies in the face of sensible health policy. Prevention is better than cure, and we know that the member for Millner is particularly attracted to that; he just told us about it. Prevention does save money, but more importantly, it reduces suffering. Given that we know that the Northern Territory is home to a population which suffers more per capita than any other with preventable lifestyle diseases such as heart, renal and respiratory disease, there is nothing in this budget to support and promote prevention of these conditions. Health professionals will cringe when they understand what this budget will not deliver. Shame on the Labor government for not funding these areas adequately.
Unfortunately, on budget Tuesday, the Martin Labor government put a real spin on their health budget story, and the message is out that there is a real increase in the budget of $14m - and for a few days, I am sure some people will believe it. One group that could not be fooled and has already scoffed on ABC TV that this budget increase is only enough to cover inflation is NTCOSS, the Northern Territory Council of Social Services. NTCOSS is an umbrella group representing a respected variety of non-government organisations who provide services to people in need. NTCOSS provided the government with a detailed submission, and I have a copy here, to assist in the preparation of this budget. I am sure that they will be disappointed with the lack of real growth in the funds available to NGOs. The minister, in her budget response yesterday, provided no details which would give heart to most NGOs.
As a final comment on the health budget and the minister’s budget speech yesterday, the minister outlined the key initiatives to receive extra funding. They included mental health, dental services, renal dialysis, child protection, child nutrition, HIV/AIDS, the new A and E at RDH, and telemedicine. For the record, I welcome these increases and I wish the minister and her staff well on them. However, you must forgive me if I am a little sceptical given the minister’s inability to deliver on the services and capital works she promised last year.
Through the Estimates process, which will be held in a couple of weeks, I will find out whether or not we received the resources promised for the 2002-03 year, such as 25 extra health professionals to work exclusively on child health issues in rural and remote areas, an extra eight Family and Children’s Services staff, 20 extra nurses, and $500 000 worth of extra staff in the RDH emergency department. We know we did not get the promised hospice or the new hospital incinerator. I have not seen or heard of any details covering the delivery of the staffing promises, hence my scepticism that the minister will deliver on this latest batch of promises, but we will see.
I cannot recall a worse year in the Territory for the delivery of health services. Staff and clients have suffered as a result of the mismanagement of the current minister. Let us hope the new financial year will be better, but the Treasurer’s budget gives me no confidence this will be the case.
Turning now to another shadow portfolio of mine, Senior Territorians. It appears that, for the new financial year, the Chief Minister has received a significant increase in funding for this area, an increase of $226 000, to make a total budget allocation of $527 000. Consequently, the budget provides an outline, which indicates that there will be an increase in activities provided by the Department of Chief Minister next financial for our seniors. Much of this, I am sure, will be spearheaded by the newly-convened Seniors Round Table. I congratulate the Chief Minister on this spending, and I look forward to seeing how it advances the economic and social standing of our senior Territorians.
Another shadow portfolio of mine is Arts and Museums. Page 166 of Budget Paper No 3 for the 2003-04 financial year is a sad sight for those interested in that area. All budget lines have been severely cut, with no explanation provided. From an estimated total spending this financial year of $29.7m on these areas combined, there has been a hefty cut of over $2m for next year. The area of arts industry support is to bear the brunt of these cuts. Their budget plummets from $5.4m to $4.2m. It is a real shame to see the Martin Labor government abandon the arts. In my experience, the Northern Territory consistently produces a range of exciting, thoughtful, skilful productions, from the wild creations of the Trax Dance Company’s Rivers of the Underground to productions such as the very successful and recently staged Fiddler on the Roof. Every major centre in the Territory has arts groups which, from time to time, receive important funding assistance from the Territory government. To see this support drying up as a result of the Martin Labor government’s mean action is a real shame.
This government should be ashamed of these cuts: libraries cut by $182 000; Museums and Art Galleries cut by $510 000; arts industry support, as I detailed earlier, cut by $1.183m; and the Alice Springs Cultural Precinct cut by $137 000. This is a very poor and short-sighted move. I believe the Territory, under the patronage of previous CLP governments, built up an arts industry, museums and art galleries, and libraries of which we could be really proud. It is going to be a real shame to see them deteriorate under the Martin Labor government. The sooner the CLP is re-elected, the better, so we can put a halt to the undermining of these important community resources.
Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, a few words on my electorate of Port Darwin. The budget flags spending of $3m for preparatory works for the Darwin Convention Centre. Given the decision of where the centre will located has not been made, I am very doubtful that much of this money will be spent this year. I suspect it will be like the hospice; not much to show after 12 months. Likewise, I am sceptical about the $1m for site works – whatever that means – at Stokes Hill Wharf, especially as last year this Labor government said they were going to do the cathodic protection installation at Stokes Hill and it was never done. Thankfully, it appears again in this year’s budget.
Finally, could the government come good on their promise of last year to widen the Dinah Beach boat ramp? I know the members for Karama and Sanderson will be very disappointed to know that this promise from last year - a promise they were so happy to be seen promoting in the media, never came off. Can they put some pressure on their Caucus mates to see it is delivered this year?
Mr DUNHAM (Drysdale): Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, my responsibilities cover Business, Industry and Resource Development, Essential Services, Transport and Infrastructure, Asian Relations and Trade. I am also on the Environment Committee, as you well know, Madam Acting Deputy Speaker. I hope to make a few comments in the Health and Community Services area, given that this continues to be a passion of mine, and, of course, my electorate of Drysdale.
However, I thought I would start with some quotes. The best one came from the mouth of the Treasurer. He had the one that came second best too, but we will start with the best. This is from the Hansard of 27 May 2003. It starts:
- You take your chances with these figures, and we do try...
That is true. Last year there was an enormous smokescreen about accrual and cash accounting. This year, we have true comparisons, except for a couple of areas where they have merged a few little units and they have moved them around.
The next quote was a close second, and that was also from the Treasurer, when he went on Fred McCue’s program. Fred was pumping him for some information on the budget. As it happened, most of the information was in the public realm by the time the budget was delivered in any event, because of the various strategic leaks that included front page stories about $5m for declaring war on itinerants and various other things.
The Treasurer told Fred that he would stand and deliver. That is a very honourable expression amongst bush rangers. It has been in Australian literature for a long time. In fact, it was the standard term when people were thieving other people’s property, to hold up the coach with: ‘Stand and deliver’. That is what our Treasurer has done.
The other thing that is notable in this first budget from the current Treasurer is that it is a feature of the Martin Labor government that if something is smelly, the Martin in the Martin Labor government leaves it to somebody else to do. So we have this interesting phenomena where other people come out with the bad news, and she takes all the good news. For instance, if there is going to be an upgrade at Marrara: good news. If there is an overrun at the Marrara construction, I will bet you that the minister for sport is out there explaining it.
In this new government, what we have seen is a wondrous cleansing of all the things from the past and cash flowing everywhere. Somewhere along the line, the Chief Minister sat down and thought: ‘Uh oh. The next budget is going to be pretty tricky. I might flick it to Syd’. That is what has happened. It is a real comedy show over there; it is a bit like another Martin - Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. This is the bloke who is doing the slapstick stuff. I can remember not that long ago, there was a bloke who had his fingers sewn back on because two of them were on the deck and they said: ‘Let us throw the shark back’, and he grabbed the head. Syd, you have grabbed the head. I tell you what, mate: it is biting and flashing around. The other one up at the safe end is still doing this pious Martin Labor government thing. We think it is a little Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.
If you really look at where the current Chief Minister comes from, there is an insight. It appears in a very august circulation here in Australia called the Australian Financial Review. There was a full-page article with a lovely photo of the Chief Minister, on 13 January this year. It gives a bit of an insight into what the Chief Minister thinks her government should achieve. Let us have a look at some of them. It starts in quite a florid way with this quote:
- Clare Martin no longer sleeps through the night. Since she became Chief Minister of the Northern
Territory 15 months ago, she has been buzzing with so many ideas that her brain has been down
loading at night.
She also imagines markers that indicate the gas pipeline below the water. Well, that is also the CLP, as everybody well knows, with the Wickham Point venture.
Here is another idea: Martin believes more domestic consumers can be found for the gas. Well, we agree with that, too, and it goes way, way back. In fact, the gas pipeline to Alice Springs was upsized all the way to Mataranka for that very reason, as people would know, back in the early 1980s.
Idea four: Martin wants to more than double the size of Darwin to 250 000 people. This is a problem because we all know the population is going backwards. We all know that the legacy they have given us is pretty similar to Cyclone Tracy on Christmas Eve in 1974. The Martin Labor government legacy is cyclonic in its effect on our population. We are seeing for the first time a decrease since that terrible event when I was resident here in Darwin.
Let us have another one. She wants to keep Indonesia’s relations with Darwin warm. Well, she is keeping them tepid. We would prefer that they were more than warm. The whole thrust of governments, going right back to Paul Everingham - in this Chamber, we have had the head of government from the Philippines in here; we have had the Crown Prince from Thailand welcomed upstairs; we have had royalty from Brunei in this building; and many other leaders. This is an area where the Chief Minister and the current minister have to do more work. As I have said before in this parliament, I believe it is a cultural cringe about the fact that they are travelling overseas. They believe that it is the province of the well heeled, and other people on jaunts, and they do not want to carry that mantle. I can tell you, you have to do it, you have to travel. We will clamour, we will clap when you do it.
I am now up to idea six from the down loading brain of the Chief Minister, and this is hers, she can have this one: maternity leave in the public sector was increased from 12 weeks to 14 weeks. That is her idea and she did it, so you can have that one.
She plans to lead the Territory to prosperity. Well, that is not evident in the budget for a couple of reasons. The first is that prosperity means you have to make money. There was a Treasurer in this business, Barry Coulter, and he was fond of saying that the way to make money is to make it, mine it, grow it or show it. They are the ways of making money. If we look at the make, manufacturing has always been a problem here but certainly in arts, as my colleague from Port Darwin pointed out, and other areas, there is the potential for us to make products here. Mine it, unfortunately, we have a decrease in mining …
Mr Henderson: It was a good announcement today.
Mr DUNHAM: Yes, it was a good announcement today. It was a great announcement, but it is an indication of something. There has been a cut to mining, and I can go into the detail later on. Notwithstanding the $15m that has been put aside to continue a program that started in the CLP’s time in any event, that money cannot be found in the budget.
Grow it: there has been a cut to primary industries. Show it: we know of some of the great cultural celebrations that occurred in this place like the Arafura Games, like the V8s, like Expo, like the Finke Desert Race…
A member: Like the cricket?
Mr DUNHAM: All of these things - the cricket, okay. The cricket can only be staged at Marrara because we built Marrara. We built Marrara. We also built the university. So when you talk about exporting all this great expertise, remember where it came from. So that is not one of hers, either. The growth and prosperity has not been an idea of hers. So this girl with the quick and open mind, our leader, has only had one hit so far in her down loading ideas. She is talking about exporting expertise on desert and tropical living …
Dr TOYNE: Madam Acting Deputy Speaker, point of order. Members should be referred to through their seats, not as ‘this girl’ and this whatever you were saying.
Mr DUNHAM: I apologise. I was actually quoting from the paper, and I will quote it properly. It comes from the Chief Minister’s mouth. When she addressed an Australian Council for Infrastructure Development meeting or something, she said:
- And when they got this girl from the north…
So I do apologise because it is not normally an expression I would use for the Chief Minister, but it is a name with which she is happy to label herself.
Here is idea number eight:
- …exporting expertise on desert and tropical knowledge to the new knowledge economy. Solar energy,
remote area services and governance, water management are just some of the clusters of expertise the
Northern Territory can export.
Yes, it can because this is the legacy you have inherited; this is the legacy that we have left you. When I was involved as a Regional Director in the region of Katherine, as I have mentioned in this House before, we were putting solar energy into Turkey Lagoon, Namaliwirri, Costello and places like that in the early 1980s. The solar car challenge is something that has its heritage back in our time. It is a good idea, but it is not hers.
Let us go to idea number nine: a rail corridor through and land bridging to Asia. She cannot claim any heritage for that because it was talked about long before she was a resident of this place.
Here is one she can claim. We are up to idea 10. This one, she can put her brand on. She wants to hold a regional meeting on security issues in Darwin. She has failed in this idea, but it is her idea. Out of 10, we have two for her.
Idea 11: multiculturalism.
- People in Darwin take it for granted and they live it.
There, too, is another proud Northern Territory heritage that comes from the previous government. The monies that were provided for the clubs – many of which are in my electorate, including the Portuguese-Timorese, the Cypriots, the Kalymnians and others. If people look at the plaques as they go through the front doors, they will see that multiculturalism was not invented in the last 20 months.
Here is number 12:
- Darwin has restaurants, child minding centres and football fields, and there are ballet and music lessons
for the children.
Most of these organisations – and a lot of them would be funded out of Arts and Cultural Affairs – have been going for a long time. They are not the province of the Chief Minister.
So there are the ideas. This person, Jill Margot, who has written this feature, finishes with:
- Publicly, business approves of the Labor government, and Martin herself is optimistic.
Now, I don’t know what sort of researcher who would write for the Australian Financial Review could write something like that. There are a variety of devices you could use to see whether business approves of the Martin Labor government. For instance, you could go to the NT News of yesterday:
- Confidence down. Business confidence in the Territory has fallen to a record low, a key indicator
released yesterday showed.
It is an indicator of where this budget went. What they wanted to do was re-brand some of the ideas that they inherited; they were and remain good ideas, and I applaud the government for continuing them, but what they are trying to do is say that these are from the down loading brain of the Chief Minister as she lies awake in her bed at night. They are not. Neither can she claim the full support of business, even though I note yesterday that there was a feeling that there was unanimity of support, apart from those of us on this side. I can tell you that is not the case.
Why might that not be the case? Why may business not be clamouring? We know, for instance, that mining is down. It was 22% of GDP in 2001-02, as the budget papers will reveal. You are able to tell that it is down 2.847%. Primary Industries are down –4.414%. Tourism is down by $2m, as we have heard. There are three of our big drivers. When you feel the pulse, they should start to send some shock waves.
The rate of GDP growth is in decline. 2001-02 it was 4.8%, thence to 3.7%, now to 3.4%. That is a decline over three years. It coincides with this government. It is in the budget papers. These are not figures I am making up; they are figures that are reliably available if people are inclined to believe the papers that have been provided for us. The figures I just gave you, for instance, come from page 17 of The Economy, where there is a description of the drop in GDP. If you go to page 20 of the same tome, The Economy, you will see some other indicators: employment, for instance, -1.1%; unemployment is up; population, as I said, is down; nett migration, people are leaving this place. All of those things should send shock waves to the Labor party.
Tax is another good indicator of how the government is travelling. If you go to the Fiscal Strategy, which is in Budget Paper No 2, there is a nice little indicator there that shows per capita tax. In 2001-02 it was $1150, it is now $1288, and is due to drop in 2003-04 by $10. Pigs might fly, because you can see that tax is going up. This government is addicted to tax; part of its heritage as governors with the Labor Party is to make sure that you get your pound of flesh from the people. Population down, unemployment up, employment down, construction down, which is not a good sign, either.
I would have thought, when the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure was proudly proclaiming the great things that were happening in the construction front, he might have been a bit wary about using figures like that, because we find, if you look at the economy as a whole, for instance, by going to page 119 of the book labelled Economy, and I quote for the benefit of Hansard:
- In aggregate, construction in the Territory is forecast to decrease by 8% in 2003-04 to approximately
$1.448m in real terms.
These are indicators of a budget with a problem. Petrol taxes are up, that is at page 52, tax is up, as I have said, debt is up. That is an interesting one, debt. We are all indebted, when we are speaking of debt, to the Auditor-General, who is able to describe for us just what this means because it is a pretty tricky thing to ascertain. He devotes many pages to it. He says quite unequivocally the increase in actual nett debt over the prior year is $162m.
I have a newsletter from one of the candidates in the last election who was incensed by the level of debt. She heads her little newsletter prior to the election with ‘debt out of control’. She claims we have debt at record levels, it has been CLP mismanagement, and payments per capita are rising. If that was offensive to that particular candidate, they should be much more offended now when debt has gone up by $262m. The Auditor-General also finds that debt is understated.
If we go to the business of tax, I have here a copy, it is a little bit smudged, but it is about the Temporary Budget Improvement Levy. I have never seen anything like this, as an ex-public servant, where a political document of this type was put out attached to a formal government form. It says, in part:
- The levy is part of the government’s strategy to address the poor state of the Territory’s budget
and the unsustainable budget deficit inherited from the former government. The levy is expected
to raise around $24m.
Thankfully, everyone saw straight through this. They saw this as a tax that was imposed on the basis of a gammon black hole. They know that the greatest contributor to the Territory’s coffers is the Commonwealth and that the government had difficulty with those figures, as the Treasurer pointed out to us. Where is that lovely quote of his? I have quoted it once before, so I shall not again, but you take your chances with these figures.
The Temporary Budget Improvement Levy has gone. It was a stupid idea; it was a mistake that you had to admit. It was predicated on the notion that there was a thing called a ‘black hole’ which is a myth, as everyone knows.
It is interesting when you go to this government’s proud pronouncement of getting past the Berrimah Line. I only needed to get to Palmerston. I am in the fortunate position of being on both sides of the Berrimah Line. In fact, if there is such a thing, it would run pretty much straight through my electorate. If you look at Palmerston and Rural in Regional Highlights, it is described as:
- Palmerston and Rural is the fastest growing Territory region, comprising a population of 46 529. It has
a relatively young population with approximately 42% under the age of 26 and less than 5% over 65 years.
Young kids, a fast growing area, a new and green fields area in many places, and it is neglected in this budget, I am sad to say. Palmerston and rural is neglected in this budget.
It is pleasing to see the moveable $10m for the new high school in Palmerston moved into yet another financial year, very pleasing to see that. When you go have a look, for instance, at Regional Highlights for Barkly, where they continually run this case that they have been neglected under previous governments, they seem to be remarkably better off with their population of 5871. So, Palmerston is fast becoming 10 times the population of Barkly, and you have to ask why the services for this population, with 42% under the age 26, is being neglected by this government. One can only assume it is political churlishness.
The works that are in there range from Palumpa, Woodykupuldiya, Daly River and all over the place. If you actually look for something to put into your newsletter for Palmerston, it is probably the $10m school which is dangled out as a carrot over very many years. I am very disappointed with this budget on behalf of Palmerston. I note, for instance, that they have put something in there about the new port. That is good. I like the new port; it is a great idea, but it is hardly something that is a specific Palmerston and Rural initiative.
I am pleased that in my electorate, Buffalo Creek will have improved facilities. Yes, I have been on the Dinah Beach boat ramp, and no, those facilities have not occurred down there yet. The rail terminal is disappointing – that I saw in today’s paper – because it is in the wrong spot. While the building might be attractive and you can tizz it up and keep it painted and the lawns manicured and maintained, it is more important to heed what the real estate people tell us, and that is: ‘Location, location, location’. This is the wrong location. Nonetheless, it is an essential service; I am glad it is there.
It is a little hard to talk too much about any of the other initiatives, but we should all talk a little bit about crime. Crime is the stuff that the government continues to block its ears to. That is the front page of Wednesday 28 May, the headline being ‘Bored Thug Walks Free’. Any government that stands up and continually talks about how they have crime by the throat - which this mob do - continually pedals out statistics - and members would probably be aware from today’s paper that I have a personal interest in this particular bored thug, given that it was my nephew that he assaulted, and he appears in today’s paper. While it gives me some proximity, it is the sad fact that pretty much all of us in this place have some anecdotes to recall of this nature. Indeed, there are another two children in my family who have, while not the same level of assault, been the subject of random acts of violence of this type.
It is something that the government has to address. I do not believe that the $5m for itinerants will do that. In some ways, the money is quite offensive because if you look at the fact that there is going to be $3500 spent on each these itinerant people to address their various concerns, I do not think it takes much to work out that when you look at some 16 000 involved in the tourism industry, there are some inequities. In fact, the scale is quite radical and I am able to do the computations for members if they so desire. The tourism industry, as I say, is 8000 people direct and another 8000 people indirect, and they are being treated with scorn when you look at that sort of money.
Essential Services is a surprise package. The government was expecting to get $9m profit out of the government-owned corporation. They are going to get $20m; next year they are going to get $24m. These are quite radical increases to the profitability of this organisation.
Dr Burns: And holding power prices firm.
Mr DUNHAM: And holding the prices firm. That is interesting because if you are holding the prices firm it has to appear as a community service obligation. Now, community services obligations need to be explained again, Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, because there is a community services obligation for uniform tariffs which means in your electorate for instance, if power is generated at 80 cents at Epenarra and at Tennant Creek it is generated at eight cents, everyone pays 14 cents. So the uniform tariffs recognise that there will be differences in the cost of generation. They do not pay for political promises unless the government of the day want to do so. If you make a decision for instance we will erode the profitability of the Power and Water Corporation by virtue of making a political promise like, for instance, power will not go up for domestic consumers, you actually have to pay for that. That has to be paid for. It still does not appear.
I was interested in the documents tabled today, which are still relevant to the budget debate, given that they will be subject to the scrutiny of Estimates, that the Power and Water Corporation has been a bit more open about its risks. Last year, you will remember, the Treasury analysis was quite frank about some of the risks to the Power and Water Corporation, this government owned corporation. They were very coy about where some of those risks might be. We are at some disadvantage because we have an annual report which is produced in such fine print that it defies most people to be able to read it unaided. We also have a couple of documents that were tabled today. There is a great lack of information about this organisation, and there is a great necessity to question its profitability, particularly given that it has had such a radical jump in profit, its capacity to be able to sustain the government’s promise of no increases, and what it is going to do about commercial electricity increases.
There are some discussions in some of these budget documents that will need some questioning because it would appear that the Treasury description of the domestic pegging is very different from the political description. I was able to find it fairly easy and I would hope that the minister responsible will be able to do that because he will be asked questions, come Estimates time.
I would like to quickly talk about some of the issues that have emerged from committee work, particularly the Environment committee. There are two issues of relevance. One is the cane toad reference. It is really important that some monies are provided for that because there are some things that can be done, particularly in relation to education. One should be careful, though, that this is not cost shifting, that other programs, other species at risk, other important works of the commission are not taken away and cut because it is a noteworthy, topical and highly public issue relating to the cane toad.
I will be watching because if this government thinks they have a sleight of hand by running new money for a sexy issue and the reality it is actually old money that was used to greater benefit somewhere else, the government will stand condemned, certainly by me.
The other thing is to set up an Environmental Protection Authority. We have done no work on this yet. It will cost money, and it is one of those things that I suspect will be fudged out close to the election, where it will turn into a promise in some sort of a bidding war that the government hopes to achieve with the CLP. The reality is it has to be funded. Certainly some of the advice has to be, perhaps some travel, perhaps something akin, dare I say, with the PAC looking at how you would set up an Estimates Committee. But that work is now tardy. This committee has been underway for some time, and that work is not being done.
I hope that some of that money would be made available not in next year’s budget because we are hard up against an election calendar. I hope some of that money is made available this year. It does not appear in the budget as far as I can ascertain, and it is up to the government to describe how that committee will have the capacity to do that very important work prior to it becoming an urgent task just before the election and it is put off.
I would like to commend the Martin government on this budget, but I cannot, and the reason for that is that it is a terrible budget.
Dr Toyne: A point of order, Mr Acting Deputy Speaker. The member’s time has well and truly expired.
Mr DUNHAM: Not on my clock, mate.
Dr Lim: He has two more minutes yet.
Mr DUNHAM: As I said, if I had the opportunity I would talk about health. It is absolutely unbelievable to me that there would be a shift out of the community and primary health care sectors into the acute sector of the magnitude that has happened. The shift at that level stands this minister condemned; it defies every bit of research that has happened anywhere in the western world; it defies any health paradigm available to members. It is one of those issues that, if you don’t believe me, talk to your researchers. But I can tell you …
Mr ACTING DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Drysdale, your time has expired.
Mr DUNHAM: Is the clock at fault?
The DEPUTY CLERK: It is not winding up.
Dr TOYNE (Justice and Attorney-General): Mr Deputy Speaker, I had intended to pick up on some of the more credible points being made by the opposition through the course of this debate, but I do not think it my task to accommodate it.
To take the example of the member for Drysdale’s contribution just now, when a budget has been widely accepted by the community, as this one has, you certainly rob yourself of credibility if you stand up for half an hour and drivel away on every negative point you can think about, whether it is true or not, you will drift off into irrelevancy, and that is probably where you belong. Where you have a very well deserved reputation as Minister-do-nothing, during the time that you were in a ministry, it is pretty rich to lecture to us about what should be done about these very important issues. I point out, as a very good example of that, the assault that you are so worried about right now occurred when you, the CLP, were in government. Why didn’t you do something about it if you were so worried?
Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, I am pleased to be speaking today on the highlights of this year’s budget from the perspective of the Justice, Corporate and Information Services and Central Australian portfolios. This budget, the mid-term budget for the government’s first term of office, is a responsible one. It ensures the government will meet its budget reduction targets, bringing the budget back into balance by 2004-05, as promised. No longer will the Territory be spending more than it receives.
It is also a responsive budget, delivering on jobs, improved health, better schools, a safer community, and reducing taxes. In my Justice portfolio, we have been working hard to provide the frameworks, infrastructure, and initiatives which will build a safer community for all Territorians. We have been looking at short-term solutions and laying the groundwork for a long-term future for a safe, equitable and harmonious community.
Over the past year, my department has been moving forward, implementing our election commitments, and working to provide all Territorians with access and equity through regionalisation of services and community safety initiatives. I take this opportunity to genuinely thank everyone in the department for their enthusiasm, commitment and hard work which has enabled us to achieve so much during the last year.
Let me briefly report on some of the highlights. In stark contrast to the shadow spokesman’s contribution in which he said we have done nothing, what we have done is make strong progress on crime prevention and partnerships against crime, with seven Regional Crime Prevention Committees established and more on the way - in fact, this very day, I announced another three. Local crime prevention work has been supported by a $400 000 crime prevention grants program. We have delivered on our election commitment to release accurate and comprehensive crime prevention statistics. Our new Information Commissioner is on board, and the Information Act will commence on 1 July. A new Anti-Discrimination Commissioner has been appointed, and services have been extended to Alice Springs. The department’s Legal Services Division is delivering better services through reforms to the way it does business. The Community Justice Centre trial is starting tomorrow in Darwin and regional centres around the Territory.
We have delivered on reforms to victims of crime, and continue to look at improvements in this area, another election commitment. We have vastly improved access to the NT’s Birth, Deaths and Marriages and Land Titles registers. We have signed the Indigenous Deaths in Custody Communique, and started work on delivering on the commitments we have made.
Our Fines Recovery Unit has delivered a more rational and equitable system of fine recovery and kept people out of goal for merely defaulting on a fine. Drug courts are about to commence, implementing another election commitment. We have worked hard on public liability insurance reforms to deliver stable public liability premiums to businesses and clubs, and to extend coverage. We have revamped our approach to Consumer Affairs, sound protection of consumer rights of Territorians, an important area we believe has long been neglected.
The Office of Business and Consumer Affairs has provided invaluable support to incorporated sporting and community associations, with new legislation being finalised in this area.
This year’s budget is responsible and responsive, as I said. Working in a financially responsible manner will enable us to consolidate the work in the Justice portfolio, continue our record of sound achievement and move strongly forward. I am pleased to announce the government has committed $250 000 to enable the Department of Justice to establish a greater presence in Alice Springs. Building on the enthusiasm of the Central Australia and Barkly communities for Building a Safer Territory, this new office will provide a Central Australian presence for our Office of Crime Prevention, demonstrating our determination to provide access and equity for all Territorians. The new office will support our whole-of-government approach in tackling crime across Central Australia, provide invaluable support and expertise for crime prevention initiatives in the region through the transfer of a position of the Office of Crime Prevention in Darwin to Alice Springs. We will be providing close support to the three Regional Crime Prevention Councils operating in the Centre and in the Barkly; help to strengthen indigenous input into crime prevention, community safety and sentencing strategies in the region through the two new Correctional Services positions to be based in Alice Springs; provide a position to support our focus on preventing re-offending by working on re-integration strategies for the released prisoners in conjunction with another position based in Darwin.
I am pleased to be able to announce that the establishment of the new Alice office, together with funding of $150 000 in this budget, will allow us to extend the Community Justice Centre trial to Alice Springs, providing access to mediation services for neighbourhood and small claims type disputes, and win-win alternatives to expensive and lengthy litigation or court appearances. The Alice office will also consolidate existing Justice services in the Centre, such as Consumer Affairs, establishing a significant presence for the Department of Justice in Alice Springs, providing access to the department and its services for all Centralians. The work of this new office will be complemented by an additional $200 000 provided in the budget to support Alice in 10 initiatives, including the Central Australian Crime Prevention Council and the establishment of dry areas in town camps.
To support our push to tackle re-offending and introduce Integrated Offender Management, this budget provides $520 000 for new offender programs and integration strategies. A powerful point of the attack on crime is through strategies to prevent re-offending. The Integrated Offender Management Program I investigated in New Zealand will support that goal. The program will continue to provide programs, such as drug and alcohol and anger management courses, to help address some of the underlying causes of criminal behaviour; ensure continuing family and community support for prison inmates, to help them successfully return to their communities on release; and provide basic educational programs and vocational training to help offenders find productive work on their release, gaining employment being one of the easiest ways to prevent re-offending. These are not soft options and preventing re-offending benefits the community with lower crime rates and lower economic and social costs associated with crime.
I am pleased that $5.25m has been provided to fund a strategy focussing on itinerants and antisocial behaviour in all major Territory centres. Under the Itinerant Strategy, programs will be established to rehabilitate and reintegrate itinerants back to their families and communities. Community Day Patrol hours will be extended. The opening hours for the sobering-up shelter in Darwin will be extended, and the information and referrals office within Centrelink will ensure itinerant people can access mainstream welfare services. We will look at whether it is feasible to extend the drug court to include alcohol-related crime and we will be looking at building on the Mala elders’ Return to Country initiative.
The Department of Justice, including the Office or Crime Prevention, will be involved in developing and supporting the implementation of the Itinerant Strategy, together with other government agencies and indigenous organisations. My departments will be reviewing legislation within my portfolio dealing with antisocial behaviour. The review will look at the feasibility of amending the Bail Act to allow courts and police, in appropriate cases, to bail an itinerant person to appear at a court in a community where the person normally lives. Existing offences under the Summary Offences Act, such as offensive conduct, loitering, begging and drinking in public places, will be strictly enforced and the creation of new offences will be considered.
Together with the budget initiatives I have just outlined, the year ahead will see continued emphasis on crime prevention work and community safety partnerships. In conjunction with the $3m funding boost to police resources, and our commitment to fund recommendations in the O’Sullivan Review, we have a program which is targeting crime and community safety on all levels. Our Office of Crime Prevention has been funded for $2.36m for the next financial year, an increase of $187 000. As well as establishing a permanent presence in the Alice, the Office of Crime Prevention will be consulting closely with the community to develop a comprehensive crime prevention strategy for the Territory. That strategy will capitalise on one of the leading strengths of the Territory as a cohesive and supportive community, and will provide a framework for continuing coordinated crime prevention and community safety action.
The Office of Crime Prevention will also continue to publish independent comprehensive crime statistics; build on the significant progress that it has made this year in developing partnerships against crime with the community; continue to establish Regional Crime Prevention Councils across the Territory, with Darwin just recently holding its inaugural meeting and Palmerston on the way; continue its support for the work of local crime prevention groups through policy and practical advice, and administration of the government’s $400 000 crime prevention grant scheme; continue to work across government supporting initiatives like Youth at Risk Task Force and the trial of restorative justice in NT high schools; continue to provide the government with policy advice on broad crime prevention initiatives; research and evaluation of crime prevention initiatives to find out what works and what does not.
Moving to other areas in my portfolio, we currently have record numbers in our prisons; an indication that our crime prevention strategies are starting to bite. We will be working on strategies to help us manage that prison population. We will be looking at the need for a new bed capacity, but new prisons are an expensive option for the Territory and we want to avoid that if possible. We will also be looking at targeted punishments and investigating other options, like closely supervised community work orders and home detention for appropriate cases. As well as working on integrated offender management programs to tackle re-offending, as I outlined earlier, in keeping with our commitments under the Communique on Indigenous Deaths in Custody, we will be looking closely with indigenous communities to improve court and sentencing processes. This may include circle sentencing trials and communities taking more responsibility for monitoring home detention-type sentencing options.
In line with the new office of the Department of Justice in Alice Springs, my department will also be examining the feasibility of a one-stop shop in the northern suburbs of Darwin in the next calendar year. A one-stop shop would provide better access to the Anti-Discrimination Commissioner, victim support services, Correctional Services, and information on other departments such as services like consumer affairs and crime prevention. This budget lays the groundwork for an exciting year ahead in my Justice portfolio, and we will be working hard to consolidate and extend the many initiatives I have outlined today.
Turning to my portfolio of Corporate and Information Services and my work as Minister for Communications, I am pleased that funding of $267 000 will enable a new Archives Service to be established in Alice Springs. This significant initiative, which includes continuing annual funding of $252 000, will bring archival collections home to Central Australia. The Central Australian Collection includes photographs and documents on the history of the Centre including economic development of the region, the impact of World War II and the people of Central Australia. Centralians can finally access their own historical material in their own region. The ultimate home for the Centralian archive will be the Desert People’s Centre in the Desert Knowledge Precinct but a temporary facility will be established until that purpose built facility is available. I am delighted that after 25 years of lobbying, the Martin government has finally provided the people of the Centre with access to their own history.
The Territory’s Archive Service will also receive a boost in funding of $236 000 in 2003-04 and $226 000 in 2004-05 for a new electronic archives management system to enable it to meet its obligations under the Information Act. The new archives management system will also provide significantly greater access to the Territory’s archives and allow some archival services to be delivered across the Internet, finally bringing the NT’s archives in line with other archive services around Australia.
DCIS has also been funded for other initiatives to support government agencies to meet their Information Act obligations. The government wide records management system, TRIM, will be upgraded to improve its functionality and capacity at a cost of around $217 000 over two years. Ongoing funding of $150 000 will support the introduction and operation of the Information Act, with record management standards being developed and training and advice on records management being provided. $100 000 will enable DCIS to develop an electronic tracking system for agencies to underpin the operation of the Freedom of Information provisions of the act.
Implementing one of the government’s election commitments, $120 000 will be available to address ongoing television reception problems in Darwin’s northern suburbs. Building on the $100 000 provided in last year’s budget, a contract has been let to Communications and Wireless Services to recommend options to resolve the problems, and an extra $120 000 will enable its recommendations to be implemented.
Moving into a major initiative of this government, my colleague, the Minister for Business, Industry and Resource Development has announced the government’s procurement reforms, and I am pleased that DCIS will be an integral part of the implementation work. $300 000 has been allocated to ensure this important work is well resourced. The role of DCIS’s Contract and Procurement Unit has been confirmed by mandating that agencies use DCIS for all procurement services of $10 000 and over. This will ensure government’s e-government initiatives - and I will talk about that later - will ensure that they continue to provide a relevant and efficient one-stop shop for industry and will be supported by the use of standard practices and documentation.
DCIS will review all period contracts, assessing their potential for use more broadly across government and identifying new opportunities for common use contracts to achieve economies of scale and reduce the number of tenders processed. A Customer Services Unit will be established to provide assistance to agencies on tender assessment panels, industry briefings, procurement planning, unsuccessful tender debriefings and all procurement processes. This unit will assist agencies to establish more open and transparent communication with industry and give industry better and more timely information to plan for future projects.
Helping to implement the government’s commitment to improve its payment turnaround time to business to 100% in 30 days, DCIS has reduced its target for processing accounts from 14 days to seven days and will be responsible for monitoring payment timelines, reporting agency performance to newly established procurement council and publishing these results on the NTG web site. DCIS will be working on a number of other important initiatives during the coming year. It will continue to play a key role in ongoing work focussing on the sustainable delivery of broad band communications into remote communities in the Territory. This initiative will maximise access to important government services in remote areas and underpins our commitment to equity for all Territorians.
In other work on ICT initiatives, in September 2002 the Minister for Business, Industry and Resource Development and I hosted the first NT ICT forum. That forum launched the drive to develop sustainable strategies to grow the NT ICT industry and provide jobs for Territorians. Continuing to implement the forum outcomes will be a major focus for DCIS during the coming year.
Resources have been allocated to support work with industry on a broad range of initiatives including: the development of business opportunities both in the Territory and through exports; capitalising on the need identified in the forum for industry to collaborate with certain markets; particular exports to sustain growth; pulling together priority areas identified by the forum including broad band infrastructure and applications, increased ICT skills in the NT, capitalising on opportunities presented by the NT government including ready access to NT government intellectual property, and looking at business and federal government markets; working on the Collaborating for Growth project which will deliver business training and joint venture opportunities for those in the local ICT industry who are seeking external market opportunities; and finally, working with industry to develop the NT ICT Industry Strategic Plan.
I am pleased to announce today that another forum will be held in November this year to review and consolidate the initiatives from the first forum, solicit broad industry input and comment, and develop strategies for the next phase of industry growth and development.
Turning to other initiatives being developed in DCIS, delivering on a commitment from this government’s economic development strategy, DCIS is playing a strong role in our e-government initiative, a comprehensive program for online delivery of NT government services. With funding of $150 000, DCIS has already taken steps to update the NTG home page, install a search engine, and enable certain payments to be made online. During the coming year under DCIS, the process will be extended to provide additional online payment facilities, commence electronic lodgement of job applications for all NTG positions, automate and web-enable various services internal to government, and establish a $20 000 pilot of web-based whole-of-government HR reporting system.
I would like to take this opportunity to outline events during the coming financial year in relation to the ICT outsourcing contracts. Three of the first round of ICT outsourcing contracts will expire during the next year, and DCIS is charged with responsibility for determining the strategy for the next round to ensure that the best outcomes for government and industry are achieved. After a challenging start, the outsourcing contracts are generally meeting government’s needs, and I can assure industry there is no intent to return this work inhouse now that industry is geared up to the task.
Tenders have already been called for a consultancy to recommend options to meet the government’s future messaging needs, and a consultant’s paper has been released seeking input on models for sourcing non-mainframe applications development and maintenance of ICT consultancies.
The DCIS budget includes $30 000 for research into ICT outsourcing trends and experiences in other jurisdictions. DCIS will be consulting with industry and agencies on the options and preferred sourcing models, and implement the models through normal procurement channels.
Finally in the ICT area, the $100 000 review of the data centre is currently underway and due to report to government early in the new financial year. The outcomes of the review will dictate the future of the government’s inhouse mainframe and mid-range service facilities, and will be implemented during the year.
To wrap up the DSCIS outlook, a challenging and rewarding year lies ahead, and I would like to express my appreciation for the hard work and dedication of all the staff of DCIS, not just in those areas I have highlighted, but throughout the department.
I turn to my Central Australia portfolio. Central Australia is recognised by the Martin government as a key driver in the Territory’s economy. Tourism, mining and primary industry rely on good infrastructure to maximise their ability to create jobs and wealth for the Centre. All of these industries are set to benefit from a significant injection of capital works funding for large projects and for roads and minor works. Government also has to look to the future to new industries. That is why we are investing in Desert Knowledge, with the commencement of head works for the Desert Knowledge Precinct.
Government has a key role in supporting the lifestyle of Central Australians, developing the skills of our local population and encouraging skilled people to settle there and stay for longer. Two significant projects will have a major contribution to our lifestyle: the continuation of the upgrade of the Traeger Park sporting facility and the start of investment into the Desert Peoples Centre, an education facility that looks to the future in providing training to indigenous people from arid zones in Australia.
Community safety is being addressed, and we will put funds into upgrading our schools, police facilities and health centres. The servicing of recently negotiated land for the growth of Alice Springs and the improvement of park lands along the Todd River are vital projects for the future of Alice.
I will now turn to the details of how this budget will help to grow the Centre’s economy, increase jobs and continue to improve the lifestyle of all Central Australians. The significant construction agenda in this budget will be welcomed by the construction and tourism industry. Major projects include: $2.2m for the Desert Knowledge Precinct; $5m for stage one of the Desert Peoples Centre; $2.5m additional money to continue the work on Traeger Park, and I understand the Facilities User Groups for Traeger Park has requested the first priority of these funds is to improve the lighting to a standard that will attract major interstate and AFL games.
Other significant capital works are: $1.5m for the Larapinta residential development; $550 000 for Leichhardt Terrace parkland improvements, part of the Todd and Charles River Master Plan; and $1.05m to upgrade a number of health centres in Central Australian bush communities.
Madam Speaker, although the completion of the railway poses an economic challenge for Central Australia, we recognise it is important to the Territory as a whole, and will celebrate the arrival of the first train from Adelaide to Darwin in early 2004. Central Australian contractors will benefit from the $1.83m which is provided for fences, rail crossings and other infrastructure along the rail corridor. The $3m towards the upgrading and sealing of the Mereenie Loop Road was announced last month and has been widely applauded by the tourism industry as a major move to increase the number of tourists to the Centre and increase their length of stay. The mining industry will now benefit from a further $2m to be spent on the flood prevention, upgrading and sealing of the Tanami Road.
Pastoralists will welcome significant improvements on two key beef roads, with $500 000 to be spent on each of the Sandover Highway, and the Apatula/Finke Road to the Stuart Highway. The road to Docker River will receive $1m of upgrade, a service not only to the residents of this community, but also to those tourists and transport drivers who use this increasingly important east-west corridor.
I am particularly proud to be able to support the Finke Desert Race in a way that will help stamp its presence permanently on motor sports in Australia. The Finke Desert Race is locally grown, run by volunteers and is already one of Australia’s premier racing events. I am delighted that, as a government, we have backed it to ensure that it has $300 000 to develop its start/finish facilities, and to provide secure tenure of the start/finish land, with the possibility of sharing some infrastructure with other motor sports. I take this opportunity to congratulate Anthony Yoffa, the Finke Desert Race committee and the Major Events Corporation for the work they are doing and the profile they are receiving for this year’s Finke Desert Race.
Another issue I am passionate about is support for our fledgling horticultural industry. I am delighted that my colleague, the Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries, has provided $80 000 to undertake the preliminary work to rid the Centre of fruit fly. If we are successful in this, it will be critical to the growth of new export markets for our grape and other fruit industries. May I commend Bob Millington and Trevor Salmon from the Table Grape Producers Association for their tireless work in promoting this issue and the importance of the grape industry in general to government.
I mentioned earlier the importance of the Mereenie Loop Road for the growth of tourism in this area. Add to this the arrival of Virgin, the excellent marketing now being planned and implemented by the NTTC domestically and internationally, and we are poised to finally do well after a very hard couple of years. That is why I am pleased that the Minister for Parks and Wildlife has been able to inject significant funds into the management and development of the new Owen Springs Reserve, as well as infrastructural improvements to a number of other national parks in Central Australia. Our national parks are key destinations for most of our visitors and, of course, for us locals, and need to be maintained and improved as one of our most treasured assets.
Of course, the biggest budget expense for the Centre is our health and education, as they should be. I am delighted that, as part of this, Gillen Primary School is receiving a $340 000 upgrade; the Mutitjulu Primary School will benefit from much needed $150 000 expenditure; $5 m will expand primary health care services through the Warlpiri, Anmatjere, Luritja-Pintubi and Eastern Arrernte health care zones as part of the $30 m to be spent on regional-based community health services. The bush will benefit from significant injections of capital funds of $1.05 m to upgrade a number of health services in our region.
Finally, employment and training initiatives are crucial for all young people but, in particular, for indigenous people. That is why $80 000 has been put into Footprints Forward this year to assist businesses in Alice Springs to attract and keep indigenous workers. Twenty-four construction apprentices in remote communities will continue to be trained under the Regional Indigenous Housing Authority program conducted in conjunction with ATSIC and the Commonwealth government. I commend this budget to the people of Central Australia. It will promote growth in our major industries, assist small businesses, ensure a better lifestyle for the residents of Alice Springs and the region, and help strengthen bush communities.
Madam Speaker, in conclusion, I am very proud of the budget for 2003-04, which the Treasurer handed down this week. It is a responsible and responsive budget, delivering key areas of jobs, health, education, and community safety, while delivering tax cuts to Territorians. It will ensure that we meet our deficit reduction strategies, so that Territorians are not operating in debt and incurring the interest payments that involves. It lays the groundwork for a productive year ahead, moving forward and consolidating our work since we came to government.
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Distinguished Visitors
Distinguished Visitors
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Greatorex, before you start, I acknowledge the presence in the gallery of Mr Ross William Jagamarra, President of the Julalikari Council in Tennant Creek, and Mr Joe Gumbula from Galiwinku. On behalf of all members, I extend you a warm welcome.
Members: Hear, hear!
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Dr LIM (Greatorex): Madam Speaker, I join the debate on the Appropriation Bill and to reflect on some of the points that have been made by many of the ministers in this Chamber, and also what the Chief Minister said.
Many people came to the Territory, some of them 20 or 30 years ago, or even longer. I recall when I came here in the early 1980s, about the third year of self-government: you come to the Territory, you look at it, and there was an opportunity to work. You came, you worked, you raised a family, you bought your land, built your own home, you ended up staying here. You ended up staying here because this was a place of opportunity; a place where you could grow your family in reasonable safety, make a reasonable income, and access many of the opportunities that most other Australians do.
But over the last couple of years, Madam Speaker, I suggest to you that many opportunities have been lost. This budget is very lacklustre with very little vision, demonstrating more of a harvesting-type mentality, a hoarding mentality - more than likely so that they can trot out all this money in a couple of years time just prior to the next election. That it is a very cynical exercise of a government that already understands and knows - I am sure they know, they cannot be that thick that they do not understand - that Territorians are suffering, and Territory businesses are suffering very badly.
For this government to continue to hoard and harvest money that has been generously provided by the federal government to the Territory is, I believe, an unjust act. That we have received over the last couple of years and the next year some $740m more than the CLP did in the last term of government tells you there was never a black hole, never was. Yet they cannot spend the money that they are receiving so generously from the federal government in providing services that Territorians desperately need. I will come to those in a while.
Let me go to the portfolios that I shadow at the moment. In Ethic Affairs, the Minister for Ethnic Affairs barely spent three minutes on that portfolio, speaking about the Interpreter Service and nothing much more. For two years now, there has been no specific section within the budget papers on Ethnic Affairs. There is a small, one-liner under the Department of the Chief Minister. If this government was so serious about the ethnic communities of the Northern Territory, this minister should spend more time explaining what he proposes to do for ethnic communities in the Territory.
The Northern Territory has over 60 formalised ethnic groups and they deserve all the support they can possibly get. We have seen over the last six months letters to the editor saying that this government had neglected ethnic communities to the extent that people were prepared to write letters publicly stating who they are. It was not until the minister felt that he had to respond that some money then came forward and at least now we see some funding provided to the Buddhist Society to develop their hall.
Mr Mills: They were shamed into it.
Dr LIM: It is a pity that they had to be shamed into it. That’s right, I pick up the interjection from the member for Blain. Until there was public criticism of the government, there was nothing to be seen.
The Minister for Central Australia spoke about quite a few things that he proposed to bring to Alice Springs. I am glad, for the first time in the two years that he has been in this parliament as the Minister for Central Australia, that he at long last recognised that there are things in Central Australia that need support. He spoke about the Finke Desert Race and how proud he was that he was able to secure funding to relocate the Finke Desert Race start and finish line, some $300 000 worth. He praised the Finke Desert Race, and I share with his praise of the Finke Desert Race organising committee. They have done a lot of great work over the last 25 years or so to promote this event nationally and internationally. I have been personally involved as a support person, medical officer for the race, and they organise a very professional event.
I am also glad that at long last his government has recognised that the Quarantine Block, as it is called, is now going to be used for the start and finishing line. But $300 000 is barely enough. The old Quarantine Block was earmarked for the combined motor sports for Central Australia. $300 000 will go nowhere in improving anything apart from a small patch of ground in that area. The Minister for Central Australia well knows that CADRA, the Central Australian Drag Racing Association, desperately needs a new strip. It has been lobbying this government for two years and all the minister could say the other day during Question Time was that CADRA could come and share the facilities. Share the facilities to do what? CADRA needs a bitumen strip that is at least a quarter of a mile long, and that costs a lot of money. $300 000 is not going to provide enough gravel to surface the quarter mile. If the minister was serious about that, he would be going back to CADRA, talking to them, responding to all their requests with your office to meet with you and then, maybe, there would be a chance for proper development of the old Quarantine Block to accommodate all the motor sports in Alice Springs. As he well knows, the Arunga Park drag racing group also want to move to the old Quarantine Block, and it would be good to see all that come together. If he could do that, I am certain Central Australia would be appreciative of this government. Unfortunately, all he can say is $300 000 and no more.
The minister also spoke about Alice in 10 and the $200 000 provided for some of the programs there. Alice in 10 has been languishing for the last two years. Had it not been for the Desert Knowledge project that started prior to this government coming in - and I am glad to say that it has continued to progress the development of the Desert Knowledge project including the Desert Peoples Centre - Alice in 10 would have fallen on barren ground.
About a month or six weeks ago, the Chief Minister launched a program called Footprints Forward, which was to encourage indigenous youth into employment. It is a great program, but I recall a similar program called Employment Alice which was launched some six or seven years ago by the then Federal Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, Senator Heron. It was essentially an identical program to Footprints Forward. I hope there is a commitment by government - and this is joint government funding; this is not entirely Northern Territory government; the federal government has contributed a significant proportion of money - to ensure that the program has longevity.
There is nothing worse than bringing an Aboriginal youth in, give him six months support and then say: ‘Okay, you have had your six months. You are on your own’. You are just setting up the young person to fail. It is absolutely useless, doing that sort of thing. It has to be a dedicated long-term program running several years for not only the youth, but the program itself. There must be strong fostering, strong mentoring of the Aboriginal youth to ensure that he continues to receive positive encouragement in employment and to ensure that he can deal with the difficulties he might encounter during employment. Unless you do that, the program will not work, and $86 000 is a scant amount of money, but I look forward to positive outcomes from that program. If the Minister does not look after it, it is going to fall over.
Talking of Desert Knowledge, head works will commence hopefully some time this financial year, and $2.2m is not much at all. When I looked at the budget papers and saw that allocation and the Desert Peoples Centre’s $5m allocation, I asked myself: ‘Whose money is this?’ I know the federal government is contributing some $95m to the Desert Knowledge project over five years and the Northern Territory government is contributing some $15m. Nowhere in the budget papers does it tell me what portion of money comes from the feds and what comes from Northern Territory government. It will be something that the minister might take on board; he will be asked that question come the Estimates.
The Desert Knowledge Centre is obviously a big project with huge potential for Alice Springs and the arid areas of Australia. I am particularly excited by the project itself, knowing that some 32 universities across the country and overseas are going to be working as a consortium to support the outputs from this project. One quarter of the world is in arid zone, with about one billion people living in arid zones, so there is a huge market out there that can tap into the knowledge that we have already produced in Central Australia. This will go a long way to formalising research in Central Australia and sharing and selling this information overseas.
The Desert Peoples Centre is a cooperative collaboration between Batchelor College and the Centre for Appropriate Technology. This is the right direction for indigenous education to move. Coming together within the precinct of the Desert Knowledge project will be a good start. There is substantial funding from that consortium to develop their education centre. It is a pity that the Institute of Aboriginal Development is not part of this consortium at the moment. I hope, in due course, IAD will see the value of the Desert People’s Centre and will come in under that wing. To see the IAD determine, for whatever reasons, to stay at the South Terrace address appears to be fighting against the tide. IAD will be left out in the cold and that will be a real tragedy because IAD serves a great purpose in Central Australia and can do a lot more for itself were it part of the Desert Peoples Centre.
Moving to items like the Traeger Park redevelopment, I look forward to that. For two years now, the government has not really spent anything that was not committed by the previous government. I would like to see the lights go up soon so that Traeger Park can be used by national teams, and the grandstand, which is something that Traeger Park users have been dreaming about for a long time. If that can come about, it would be good.
The Cultural Precinct is something that I remember. I think it was 1983 or thereabouts when the Araluen Arts Centre was opened, and over the years it has evolved and become the core of the Cultural Precinct for Alice Springs. The Aviation Museum, the Strehlow Centre and the Araluen Arts Centre have all come together under the umbrella of the Cultural Precinct. To see this area’s funding has been cut back is something I cannot understand. Last year, the government forced it, literally, to charge an entry fee for people to visit the arts centre, and now they have cut funding even further. For no reason that I can discern from the budget papers, it has cut the funding back by $137 000. The Araluen Arts Centre cannot afford to lose that sort of funding. That will make it very difficult for the precinct to operate. For a long time, I have said the Araluen Arts Centre tends to be elitist because it used to very expensive to get in there. The cheaper we can make it for people to access the Araluen Arts Centre, the more likely the whole of the community will go to the centre. If the government cannot do that, then all it is going to do is going to push the thongs and stubby person out of the Araluen Arts Centre and that was never intended.
The government has started to spend some money, at long last, on dealing with law and order issues. The minister himself just said he is opening an office of the Department of Justice in Alice Springs, he is spending money on crime prevention. Maybe, at long last, he has heard what the Alice Springs community has been trying to tell him for the last two years that he has hardly been there. At long last, he has heard that law and order has broken down in Alice Springs and something had to be done. I am glad. Do not get me wrong; I am glad that he is spending money in Alice Springs to ensure that things are being done. It is too little, too late, but it is better than nothing. I look forward to seeing how well the money will be spent and how the programs will be able to bring about better law and order in Alice Springs.
It is well and good to say ‘We feel safe in Alice Springs’, and all that. It is not safe. I feel safe in Alice Springs because, number one, I am male, and I am well known by the community. I have a very identifiable face and people will not attack me. However, I know that when my family walks down the street, they are sworn at, they are called ‘White f’ing cs’, and all sorts of things. Why should they have to be subjected to that? Why should they be subjected to intimidation when they walk down the street? That is the problem. I am not intimidated because I relate differently. I have a relationship with people and I do not have the problems that others face. There is an issue, and the government must take note and make Alice Springs a safe place, because right now, it is not.
On the Itinerant Strategy the government proposes and is spending a substantial amount to support indigenous people coming into the major centres, I am curious as to how the government is going to do it. They have put money aside for it, but as yet has not articulated how it proposes to do it. I wonder whether the government is looking at providing temporary housing for people passing through the major centres within the town camps themselves by having a separate area, build special housing and allow people passing through the community - whether it be Darwin, Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, wherever – to have temporary accommodation. I find it interesting. If the government is exploring that idea, that is fine. I would like to see how you develop that. The government needs to articulate how it is going to do it because it is spending a lot of money, something like $3000 per person it intends to spend. That is a lot of money to be spending. Territorians need to know which way this government is going to go.
Let me come to some of the other portfolios for which I am responsible. Looking through the budget papers I note that, almost across the board, the housing budget has been cut. Again, I cannot discern from the budget papers the rationale for so doing. The minister, during Estimates, might like to respond to some of these questions. For instance, on page 181 of Budget Paper No 3, households assisted through public rental housing has gone down some $0.5m. In 2002-03, he budgeted $6.745m. His estimate for this year was $6.945m, so the estimate for this year is going to be more than he budgeted for last year. What rationale does he have to now decrease the budget to $6.455m, some 7.6% less than he is going to spend this year? If the government is serious about assisting people in public housing then, surely, the budget should at least go up with CPI. Maybe people in public housing are not important to the Martin government. If that is the case, then so be it. It makes no sense to me why this government has cut back on that.
Client satisfaction with the provision of public housing assistance is only 70%. No attempt to improve that client satisfaction is not acceptable. It means that 30% - three in 10 people - living in public housing are not happy with the service. The government has to do something about that; it cannot just leave it alone.
Community service obligations, the CSOs, have come down by 13%. On page 183 of Budget Paper No 3, the community service obligations have been decreased by $3.878m. That is a 13% decrease in CSOs. When I was the housing minister, the CSOs were designed to ensure that public housing can be modified to assist the people in those homes. It looks like the government is cutting back on this program for some reason; 13% is significant. I look forward to an explanation from the minister as to why that has taken place.
Last year with repairs and maintenance, the minister got himself into all sorts of strife trying to explain why the budget had been dropped by some 20% and he could not extricate himself quick enough but his explanation was never satisfactory. This year, I note that repairs and maintenance has gone down again by 7%. So each year the stock, as it gets older, is receiving less maintenance. That does not make sense. If you have housing stock that is ageing and you decrease your repairs and maintenance, what is going to happen to it?
I am glad to see that a place like the Gillen House Seniors Village was completed and was occupied by people around the area a few months ago. I am glad to see how successful seniors villages across the Territory have been. I have not seen anything earmarked in this budget for further development of seniors villages in the Territory. The government, the minister, should know full well that this is a sought after style of accommodation that has been particularly good for our seniors. There is nothing in the wings and for them to start again is going take a long while. Having said that, with the seniors accommodation being so high in demand and being built so widely across the Territory, you would have thought that the houses that were formerly occupied by these seniors will now be released into the rental market. But blow me, if I read this correctly, on page 181 of Budget Paper No 3, the average waiting times for public housing for two bedroom is 18 months and has always been around that; for three bedroom homes, it used to be less than a year. In last year’s budget papers, the minister estimated it would be 10 months waiting time. Guess what! It blew out to 18 months, and there has been no attempt in this budget to reduce the waiting times. Eighteen months is a long time to wait, especially when you have this extra stock of homes.
Maybe the reasons are that since seniors have vacated those homes, there is not enough in the repairs and maintenance budget, so these houses are going to be sitting there, vacant and languishing. That is cheating Territorians. There are reasonably good homes available, people are waiting for them, there is a queue of 18 months, the minister should be putting a bit more money into it, provide good repairs and maintenance to those homes so that people can move in with shorter waiting time. But no, he is not doing that. Then he says our housing budget has dropped significantly because the Commonwealth-State Housing Agreement has taken away $14m this year. If he is doing his job properly he should be able to convince the federal minister to ensure that adequate funding comes to the Territory.
I recall the time when I took the federal minister and our interstate colleagues to visit Hermannsburg and show them indigenous housing in the bush. Through that visit to Hermannsburg, we received one-off funding from the federal government. The minister should be able to do that. He should be able to convince his Labor colleagues, after all they are all Labor colleagues now, across the country, that the Northern Territory deserves a larger slice of Commonwealth-State Housing Agreement funding. We need to provide good housing for Aboriginal people in the bush. For the minister to sit back and say: ‘We have no money left. The money has been taken away from us by the feds,’ and he has not done a thing about. That is not right.
In the few minutes I have left, I would like to mention a couple of issues that are favourites of mine. One is the formation of the Charles Darwin University, the result of the amalgamation of the Northern Territory University with Centralian College. I have said before that there is a concern things are galloping way too fast. The Northern Territory University came about in 1984. It was in the developmental stage: we had to look for premises. We ended up at the old Darwin Hospital at Myilly Point. We created the University College against all odds. The Federal Labor government of the day was definitely against us, without a doubt, and the Labor Party in opposition in the Northern Territory was not going to give us one iota of support. We forced our way. The Northern Territory government funded the enterprise, and it was through total funding by the Northern Territory government that we established the University College of the Northern Territory. Since that time, it has evolved though amalgamation with the Darwin Institute of Technology to become the Northern Territory University. That occurred, I think, in 1989.
The Northern Territory government under the CLP continued to fund the NTU for a long time, and it was through a lot of lobbying – initially, we failed with Susan Ryan, but fortunately we secured enough funding through the last terms of the Liberal government – that we funded the Northern Territory University. With the amalgamation with Centralian College, I am concerned about Year 11 and 12 students are going to be in an adult environment, and that is a major concern. There must be some surety that there is good pastoral care for these kids because they are going to be in an environment that is not normal for schools. To have that amalgamation going on at the moment, rushing to take in Palmerston High School and Casuarina Senior College might be too precipitous. It would be better to have a few years to allow the amalgamation to work to ensure that the pastoral care is properly organised before embarking on taking on other senior colleges in the Territory.
Madam SPEAKER: Your time has expired, member for Greatorex.
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Distinguished Visitor
Distinguished Visitor
Madam SPEAKER: Before the member for Blain commences, I acknowledge the presence in the gallery of the Honourable Fred Finch, a former member of the Legislative Assembly. On behalf of all members, I extend you a warm welcome.
Members: Hear, hear!
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Mr MILLS (Blain): Madam Speaker, in responding to this budget, we look at managing the economy as a challenge to avoid killing the golden goose, and that is a strategy that allows us to keep tax and spending under control without killing the golden goose.
In this budget, the golden goose, being small business, is under severe pressure. The HIH levy was not mentioned and despite strong arguments mounted justifying its removal, that has not been done. The range of initiatives that could be put in place to relieve pressure on small business have not been. I will outline, as I go through my contribution, the sorts of things that have been introduced that are placing greater impediments on business in the areas of morale, vision and confidence for the future, which translates very directly into the low rate of confidence that small business has in this government. It is a fact, and it cannot be excused in any other way than the current government taking genuine responsibility for that and responding to it properly.
Before those on the other side become sensitive, start to frown and become concerned that we on this side are very negative about the budget, by contrast, the other side of the Chamber generally can only see the virtuous and good things in the budget, and we have this strange debate where it is just one side or the other. The thinking member and community members can see the effect of managing the economy on the whole Northern Territory - warts and all; good and bad. It is incumbent upon opposition, whether it may be offensive or hurtful for the sensitive government, to expose and identify those areas that need to be attended to. It is your charter, of course, to sell the thing. You take a car to a used car salesman and you will find that your car, in the eyes of the person who is buying it, has numerous faults. But go and buy a car from the same person and you will find that the car that you are being sold has just virtues.
Mr Kiely: I always thought you had the morals of a used car salesman.
Mr MILLS: I am talking about the Northern Territory community. Let us have a look at the car itself. That is what this response is: to look at the car and assess it independently.
This budget claims to raise the bar, but I say it lowers the ground. The illusion that significant gains are made are revealed to be more trick than treat. A number of new announcements are exposed as re-announcements of previously proclaimed promises. In my shadow portfolio there are two notable examples. Palmerston High School was announced last year: a $10m high school was announced by the Chief Minister. Not so long ago, it was leaked to the NT News that a $10m high school would be built in Palmerston. Most people lead busy lives, so they get this sense of activity, but small business wonders what on earth is happening. There was an announcement made 12 months ago, there is now a re-announcement of the same thing. You can justify and explain it away all you will, but you have real people, real contractors, real small business, the engine of our economy, having the effect of these announcements with no effect on them at all. It is just words, nothing of substance. Explain it away all you like, it is just a con job.
We have the announcement again in this budget that a $10m high school will be built, but next year. Now, that may be good for creating the impression that something is happening, but for a contractor who is waiting around for the substance to match this announcement, it is a three year wait before anything does happen. We have bills to pay, we have businesses to run, and nothing is happening, although, perhaps, it is a great PR exercise on the community. But that kind of activity wears thin. We have a growing sophistication in our community and a greater cynicism than ever before of politics, and politics is seriously being played in this regard. I just use that as an example, because if you were able to assess the comments made by members on this side in responding to the budget, there will be examples in every portfolio of announcements and re-announcements, and the creating of the impression of activity when, in fact, it is announcements and re-announcements with no actual substance.
The next one is just a small one that, once again, illustrates this principle, taking the punter for a mug, that being that there was an announcement in last year’s budget that there was a $500 000 Employment Bonus Scheme. The Chief Minister, with a breathy voice, said: This is one of our highest priorities to engage young people into active work, so we are going to create these wonderful incentives. Five hundred employers will be offered $1000 each to take on young people coming out of school and entering the workforce. Well, that sounded great, and it had my support. Lo! and behold, that $500 000 is in this budget, the exact same amount, because it was not spent last time. That bonus scheme was not implemented.
Not to be deterred, the government is happy to stand by the big announcement to indicate their sincerity in dealing with the transition from school to work. They made the announcement last year; they then have the audacity to leak it to the NT News and pass it off as a great new initiative in this budget. The same $500 000, mind you! Then they make the announcement in the budget papers that this $500 000 is an initiative to assist small business to take on those leaving formal schooling and going into the workforce.
There has been a lot of mileage from the same amount of money and it is, once again, designed to create an impression of activity - a great pretence, when it is the same $500 000. It has not been accessed; it has not been invested in the lives of young people to assist them in transit from school to the workforce. It is smoke and mirrors; a trick with no treat and nothing to substantiate the claims. That really is disgraceful.
This sort of thing is filtering down into the psyche of the Northern Territory. People are starting to realise that this is a sham, and the community is being treated disrespectfully in this budget. Certainly, the Labor Party has a sense of great virtue and a sensitivity about social injustice. You are finding yourself doing the most incredible backflips that I am sure embarrasses even yourselves. One is CDL - passionately, earnestly, sincerely believe that this is the way to go - end up on that side: ‘Whacko, I have seen the light’. There is Wickham Point: ‘We will defend the environment’. However, then you go and enlarge the spot at the end of Wickham Point and talk about turning that whole area into an industrial estate.
Mr Kiely: I see. So you do not want development.
Mr Wood: In the middle of the harbour? Do you want development?
Mr MILLS: The issue here is not what we said; it is what you said. Matching that up with what you said before, with what you intended to project into the community prior to - it is called, plain and simple, hypocrisy, and the community knows it. You know that you are just playing politics and you are disappointed that you have been exposed for the thing that you never ever wanted to be. You never wanted to be the type of people and politicians that you have now become. The government that you are is the sort of government you never wanted to be.
Members interjecting.
Madam SPEAKER: Order!
Mr MILLS: When a budget is announced, we talk to members of the community and ask them: ‘What would you like to see in a budget? How would you like a budget to be cast in a way that makes a difference to you - mum and dad, small business operator, an employee in the public service? What sorts of things would you like to see in the budget?’.
We get pretty excited in here. We spend a lot of time following financial lines and matching things with this document and that document. It is pretty interesting for us, but the person in the community - the mums and dads who are hurriedly helping with the homework and trying to get a meal together, where one of them has to go out to a meeting, people who are coming home late, kids have to be taken to sport - wants to know that these fundamental issues are going to be addressed. They want to know: ‘Will this working family, under immense pressure, be receiving any real help, anything that they can notice; anything that will make a difference?’
The federal opposition made great fun of $4 that was a tax cut, but that was something that people can understand, something that makes a difference. Is there anything for working families in this budget? I cannot see it. Is the cost of living reduced? I cannot imagine families saying: ‘My goodness, that was a fantastic budget, kids. We are going to have a great year as a result of the budget that was announced a couple of days ago’.
Another fundamental and underlying concern is: what measures does this budget contain to arrest a population slump? People are leaving the Territory. Why would that be? That is a symptom of something. Is there anything in this budget that arrests that? Certainly nothing that arrests or captures attention; that issue is largely unaddressed in this budget.
For the tourism industry, is there any sense of a courageous and visionary approach to tourism, something that projects a strong and confident Territory to our nation and internationally? Is there a sense of strengthened belief and confidence in the Northern Territory? I do not see occurring as a result of this budget. I know it is a trick. Why this budget does not jump up and grab your attention and cause families to feel a little more secure about the future, why it doesn’t build confidence is because it is a lacklustre budget for a very good political reason: stalling, holding and withdrawing - just keeping it back - the tap is just open enough to keep the cogs turning, to keep the flow going, to create the impression of activity. That is all we need, just to create the impression of things happening, movement at the station. I bet that next year, this tap will be opened right up and out it will flow, and my goodness, all the grief and fear and pain will be washed away and people will feel fantastic: what a wonderful government! They are so good to us. Now they are genuine, now they are engaged and now they are pouring the funds into everything that we had been crying for. Just hold it back now, though, it is a trick, the treats will come later. That is what this budget is about.
Territorians do not really find much assurance for the top-of-mind issues in this budget, the ordinary stuff. Your finger on the pulse, and the reading hasn’t changed. Do we find any convincing solutions to arrest juvenile crime and lawlessness?
Mr Ah Kit: Yes! Yes!
Mr MILLS: No, we do not! We find, once again, the creation of activity. We fund community councils. Let’s all get together and we will talk, become engaged, it is a consultation, we want to hear what you have to say. But you know what is going on. We started this in Palmerston and we had three meetings together and we came to the end. I am not in the business of keeping people on a string and keeping them going. Just keep active because the activity is the solution. No, it is not. The reduction of crime is the solution.
We made strong recommendations at those crime forums, very clearly considered recommendations. The Attorney-General came to those meetings and very earnestly, wringing his hands, says: ‘I think we can have a marriage’. He said that. The recommendations that we made were soundly considered. He said: ‘We will take those on board and I will then persuade my Cabinet colleagues to take these recommendations on board’. Well, that was the end of that exercise, three solid community consultations. Got to the end, made our community considerations and recommendations to the Attorney-General who then said, ‘Yes, I hear what you are saying, well-considered, compliment to you citizens, I’ll take this to my Cabinet colleagues and we will see what we can do’. Do you know what happened? The recommendations made at the Palmerston Crime Forum are implemented in Tennant Creek, not in Palmerston. We have these templates of community consultation all over the countryside now, and you will just keep that activity going.
We want to see a solution as a result, not meaningless activity. I have managed people before, and you know that that can occur if you are insincere. You can keep people active, you can keep them moving, you can keep the tap flowing and you can gee them up, but the issue is to address the problem, not create the impression that you are doing something. That will come through in the end. For example, I do not know whether people are too confident about this itinerancy program because it deals with a problem and seems to be enlarging the problem by creating the capacity to deal with the current problem. Now, if we talk about aeroplanes carrying people out of the urban areas back to homelands, that is a jolly attractive thing. It is good at this end of it, but I would like to see how it tracks through all the way. Is that money actually going to flow back? We will see.
The other thing is to enlarge the capacity here in our urban communities to hold those who are currently homeless, who have chosen to take their welfare payments away from their communities, families and kids and to come and sit here and pour that welfare down their neck and we will find a nice place for them to live. What about their kids? What about their families? What about their community? We will build a place here for them to stay. We do not deal with the cause of the problem; we just fund the capacity to respond to the problem. I bet nothing is going to change. In fact, we are going to have an enlargement of a problem rather than dealing with a cause. It is hard to deal with the cause. You might have to prove yourself a little tougher. If you really do care, you may have to show that you are tougher rather than caring because your care will be translated into toughness, into proper action. You may find someone who is addicted to substances may rail against you because you are hurting my individual rights to pour your welfare down my neck. Rubbish! You need to deal with this properly. I have heard it from my colleague on the other side, it is called tough love.
Mr Ah Kit: Monstering and stomping on them!
Mr MILLS: I have never mentioned monstering and stomping. I have two good kids, and there have been times when I treated them toughly. There are times when I have had to correct them strongly because I love them, because I want them to get on their own feet. There is a time for toughness if you really care, if you really want to make a difference. It is not just care, soft, do not hurt anyone’s feelings, I’ll just help you out of this, you will come to your own senses, it is not your problem, you have a disease, it is called alcoholism, you are addicted and you need to be treated as an addict. That can be tough. I have dealt with people who have an addiction and it is not an easy thing. You cannot ease them out of that with softness and kindness. The community is going to treat this issue and the philosophy underlying it with some suspicion. After all, it is our money. We will see what the results are.
There is trickery. It continues in the health and education allocations. The trumpeting of large increases of 2.7% are revealed as just top-ups to catch up with inflation and the rising cost of living, not that that was trumpeted. I noticed that when the minister read all the wonderful accolades that have poured into the office from all the agencies, we did not have one from the Education Union, we did not have one from the CPSU because that monumental increase is in fact just to keep them ahead of the game. We will see whether this is more trick than treat.
When we assess the fact that is just a top up, it leads us to wonder how the whole show is going to hang together. What programs will be discontinued? It makes sense: if it is just a top up to keep yourself ahead of the game, and you have your attention drawn to all the other initiatives, how, then, will the whole show hold together without discarding and dropping off some programs? On our assessment of these documents, you cannot find that, but it makes sense that programs will be cut off. Which ones? We will have to wait and see.
We asked direct questions of the two ministers involved, to which we had no direct answers. However, a memo that we have come across indicates that it is exactly the case, that there are programs to be cut. We have to wait and see which ones just die on the vine.
We have had pay increases of $6.3m in education, no problem at all. This illustrates my point: with a minimal increase and an enlargement of the capacity to improve pay and conditions to teachers, what is falling off the truck? We have $3m for the IT Infrastructure program. That is fine, but once again that means on this side of the column, something has to fall off if we are just keeping up with the cost of living.
This leads me to the attendance officers. There is more money being given to attendance officers. I am drafting a letter at the moment to seek an in-depth briefing of what is the program that these attendance officers are running under. It appears that it is something that has been made up on the run. It appears that it has given the government the capacity to tell one audience that we have truancy officers – and that is jolly good; a round of applause for the government; sounds tough - then to another audience they say they are school attendance officers. That is a softer one. So we have two nice tags floating around the community to suit different audiences. When you lift the lid on these tags, it is unclear what these characters are meant to be doing. It seems like the job is being made up as we go along. What we have done is create the trick, the impression, of some activity, but the substance therein is deficient. That is the area that we have to know about. They are our funds after all. What is actually going on? We do not want to create an impression; we want to create a difference.
The other one is the alternative education programs. In some audiences, it is a program - and that is in fact what it is. The alternative education site was announced last year. A site. Now that creates the great impression that there is something, a construction, a place where these naughty kids can go. In fact, it is a program and we do not quite know what this program does. I have a letter coming, minister, to have a good look at what is going on in these alternative education programs because the titles sound fantastic.
I applaud the increased pay and conditions for teachers, infrastructure program and so on, funding for students with learning difficulties being increased to $458 000. I have some questions about the Mitchell Centre refit, however. I accept that it has been revoted. It was announced last year and it is still there today. The message last time was that the education department could come together in one building. It appears that is not the case. I want to know whether they are all getting together in the same building or not. We will see.
I do not see any evidence of a school in Palmerston. Now, you might think that is very parochial, you are the local member. For goodness sake, it is the fastest growing municipality in the Northern Territory, and we have an overcrowded Bakewell Primary School. We have more houses being built at Darla and still have no mention of head works for a school in Palmerston. It has to happen. There is not one school being built, and it has to happen in Palmerston, not just because I am the local member, but because you are putting pressure on all the other schools. They are all full, and next year will be fuller, with still nothing on the horizon.
The interesting thing is that I suspect a little trick. I have mentioned that the tap is just dripping to keep the garden alive; next year it will be flowing. I bet that next year there will be a grant announcement: yes, I think we need to build a school in Palmerston, and receive a big round of applause from the community.
Mr Kiely: You will get the credit for it for your lobbying.
Mr MILLS: Well, the community is simply calling for it. It makes sense that it does occur, and if you did that, they would applaud you, because you are in government and you would be doing the right thing. You do not play games with people. You are putting pressure on mums and dads and teachers at the moment, right now, and last year, and the year before. There is nothing on the horizon, nothing in this budget.
I applaud the support that this government has given to the restructure of Charles Darwin University. The increase in funding of $1.5m is to be congratulated. I have nothing but support for that. I have to say, though, that the volume of praise is equal to or larger than the amount of money that the federal government has put into this university. It really is extraordinary. Even the minister acknowledged that it was pretty good. What the federal government has done to support tertiary education at Batchelor College and Charles Darwin University is very good. It was an outstanding contribution; an increase of 30% above the standard rate. There are now four different categories of funding for regional universities. Those that are not far from major regional centres, like Sydney, Melbourne, Perth and so on, receive an increase, I think, of about 2.5% above the basic. It rises up to the third level, being about 2.9% or 3% or thereabouts. The fourth category is Northern Territory University and Batchelor College. They are the only two in that category, and they get a whopping 30% increase. That really has to be recognised and acknowledged as a great contribution to strengthen and stabilise the role of Charles Darwin University. I applaud, too, the leadership role that Professor McKinnon has played in advancing the concept.
I now move to boat ramps. Once again, we have movement at the station. There is action; there is a sense of activity, but I cannot see it translated into any change. Maybe at Buffalo Creek, which is in the northern suburbs, and at Dinah Beach, the money has been funnelled in; it has not produced anything yet, but the announcement has been made; the money has been tied off there. Once again, we have solid community consultation, we have a community-endorsed plan for the Palmerston Boat Ramp. We have the community on side. Don’t play politics with it and say: ‘You did not put in the paperwork last year’. Palmerston City Council did, but Palmerston knows that they are not getting the same enthusiastic support from this government as those in the northern suburbs and Tennant Creek might be getting. Watch out.
Mr Bonson: Who are they going to vote in?
Mr MILLS: So, it is about voting, is it? I thought it was about service. It is our money. It is Territorians’ money.
Mr Bonson: That is your argument. You are alleging …
Mr MILLS: I am exposing it for what it is!
Mr Bonson: You are alleging that we are spending money in the northern suburbs for that reason.
Mr MILLS: I am!
Mr Bonson: Oh, you are a joke, an absolute joke.
Mr MILLS: Because Buffalo Creek is getting it, Dinah Beach is getting it and Palmerston is not getting it. We have colossal problems down there. Come and have a look! In this Chamber, you play games with that, political games, when you have a real need.
Mr Kiely: That is the member for Drysdale’s seat! Ten minutes ago, you said Port Darwin, which is a CLP seat, and Drysdale which a CLP seat!
Madam SPEAKER: Order! Member for Sanderson, you will have your chance in a minute.
Mr MILLS: In this budget we have $350 000 for Buffalo Creek. We had some money last time for Buffalo Creek, and there is $500 000 left for the rest of the Northern Territory. Once again, the Palmerston community, who have ticked off - it is not a political game; it is a real need with a real solution that has real support from the wider community. We will be looking. We will be waiting to see what kind of response we get this time. I hope we get a good one.
I am running out of time. I will finish with the flow of GST revenue into the budget, which they have not made much of a song and dance about; they certainly made a big loud noise about black holes. However, this budget exposes a fundamental issue: that it is full of trickery, and all the treats will come later.
Madam SPEAKER: Your time has expired, member for Blain.
Ms SCRYMGOUR (Arafura): Madam Speaker, I rise to support the Treasurer’s 2003-04 Northern Territory Budget, and the prosperous outlook for the Territory.
My main focus today is in my role as Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Employment, Education and Training. I am proud to commend this budget to parliament, particularly as the Treasurer’s announcement demonstrates that jobs, education and training remain the highest priorities of the Martin Labor government.
In 2001, the Martin Labor government promised to improve employment, education and training outcomes for all Territorians, and to address neglect over many years in urban, regional and remote centres, and particularly in areas where there is a greater proportion of indigenous people. The 2003-04 Employment, Education and Training budget is a major commitment for the Martin Labor government. An amount of $520m will be allocated in 2003-04. This represents an increase of $13.5m, including an additional $2m to employ 20 extra teachers. $20m has been allocated for employment; $372m allocated for government education; $68.5m for non-government education; and $59.5m for vocational education and training. This money will be used to progress the government’s election commitments and the initiatives that flow from these.
The Treasurer has announced initiatives that will improve employment conditions for Territory teachers and support staff. The 2003-04 Budget has provided very significant increases in salaries and allowances for teachers. In particular, there is an additional $7.5m for teachers and support staff salaries and entitlements. This will ensure that teachers are remunerated at a level comparable to the highest paid teachers throughout Australia. This recognises the value and importance that teachers have in regards to educating our children. Territory teachers’ salaries increased by 5% effective from 13 March this year and will increase a further 4% effective from 11 March 2004, a total increase of 9%.
Teachers, along with other public servants, now have access to 14 weeks maternity leave. The government has also given a commitment on limiting class sizes. Also, as announced, the Martin Labor government is committed to employing 100 additional teachers at a cost of $8.14m by 2004-05. Already, 40 additional teacher positions have been allocated, with a further 20 to be allocated in 2003-04. The 20 additional positions in 2002 were allocated as follows: three special education teachers for urban schools, Casuarina Street Primary, Bakewell Primary and Woodroffe Primary; six teachers allocated to the group schools; and 11 teachers employed in non-urban schools lacking special education support. In 2003, the deployment of a further 20 is as follows: three teachers allocated to the Capability Development Unit for Recognised Schools at Risk; five principals for group schools - these staff are allocated in Darwin, Katherine, Tennant Creek and Alice Springs; two teachers allocated to remote education resource development projects; six teachers allocated to alternative education programs; and four special education teachers allocated to Numbulwar, Papunya, Moulden Park and Tennant Creek.
Madam Speaker, of the remaining 60 additional teachers, 10 will be allocated to ESL programs to target and improve literacy outcomes for students. The allocation of the remaining 50 additional teachers will be determined in consultation with stakeholders including principals and the Australian Education Union. In addition to these initiatives are improvements to the remote locality working conditions that will cost in the vicinity of $0.224m. Additional and improved housing for teachers in remote communities is essential if we are to recruit and retain teachers for those communities. My colleague, the Minister for Housing, has announced an enhanced housing program that will assist our teachers. Twenty new houses for teachers are included in the program and further monies have been allocated for security screens, fencing, housing upgrades and replacement of government housing deemed beyond economical repair.
Teachers are required to continually update their skills to meet emerging curriculum needs, and technology now plays an important part in employment, education and training. To achieve the best outcomes for children, our teachers must keep pace with technology if they are to provide a contemporary learning environment. So we are pleased to see that the first real effort is being made to provide laptop computing facilities to teachers in a flexible way. Teachers will be able to use salary sacrifice in association with a contribution by government to purchase a laptop computer for professional growth in the use of integrated communication technology, or ICT, in education.
To further assist with improving educational outcomes in the teaching profession, the Territory Labor government announced the establishment of a Teachers Registration Board. The planning and consultation phases for the board are proceeding smoothly and a steering committee representing employers and unions across the sectors has been appointed. The board is expected to be operational by Term 2 of 2004. Through the formation of a Teachers Registration Board in the Northern Territory, it is intended to enhance the status of the teaching profession and provide a dedicated organisation that can focus on the factors that affect teacher supply and demand. Another important role of this regulatory body will be to address teacher quality issues.
Madam Speaker, I turn to some of the in-school programs that will improve educational outcomes. In 2003-04, our government will continue to support the establishment and operations of a Schools Capability Development Unit. This unit will identify schools at risk and coordinate appropriate and timely systematic support to improve student outcomes. A very experienced principal of both remote and urban schools has been appointed to work with schools to improve educational outcomes, particularly literacy and numeracy skills. The unit is working to identify and define data currently collected and held which may be screened to provide an early indication of the schools at risk. The unit is already working cooperatively and successfully with a number of schools.
As announced, our government has introduced a Teacher Bursary Scheme at a cost of $0.76m to encourage NT students to stay in the Territory and complete teaching qualifications at local tertiary institutions. This scheme has improved and will continue to improve the recruitment and retention rates of teachers and reduce costs associated with recruiting teachers from interstate. For the initial intake, priority was given to applicants with the highest Tertiary Education Rank, or TER scores, who indicated their willingness to teach in remote areas, and in one or more of the following specialty areas: Special Education, English as a Second Language, Information and Communications Technology, Mathematics and Science.
The Territory Labor government has a developed a Student Attendance Officer program, and I know that the member for Blain touched on it before. As we all know, if a child does not attend school on a regular basis, it is unlikely that the child will reach any reasonable level of education and will suffer from poor literacy and numeracy skills throughout his or her life. By 2004-05 there will be eight Student Attendance Officers appointed at a total cost of $0.68m.
The Learning Lessons Review is the blueprint for our government’s agenda to improve educational outcomes for indigenous people. The recommendations of this review will be implemented, along with other government strategies, and over time this will have an impact. Significant progress has been made to date including: the government’s new Student Attendance Officers initiative, which is underway with officers commencing in Palmerston and Alice Springs; a more equitable distribution of resources to students with learning disabilities; the introduction of an effective case management approach to remote disability services; the introduction of the Northern Territory Curriculum Framework with an outcome focussed approach to planning, teaching, learning assessment and reporting, and responsiveness to local context; trials of the Accelerated Literacy Program teaching methodology in selected schools across the Northern Territory; trialling of remote secondary provisions at Kalkarindji and - pleasing to me - Maningrida CEC; the implementation of the ESL planning project delivering an equitable distribution of ESL resources and ESL training for all Northern Territory teachers; and the development of a reporting framework for the Indigenous Education Strategic Plan.
Two major projects to improve education for indigenous people have been announced. The first is the Parity in Infrastructure Program and will involve evaluating the amenity of remote school facilities and updating these to a level that is comparable to those in urban centres. In 2003-04, upgrades will include the construction of a secondary facility at Kalkarindji valued at $1m. It is proposed that the new facility will incorporate teaching spaces, administrative and preparation areas, a dance and drama multi-purpose area and multi-purpose home economics and science area plus ablution facilities.
Maningrida, there will be – oh! Madam Speaker, there will be an upgrade of the existing facilities at Maningrida at a cost of $1m. The proposal is to upgrade the balance …
A member interjecting.
Ms SCRYMGOUR: Yes, I was excited about that. The proposal is to upgrade the balance of the school infrastructure which includes classrooms and resource areas and provide a secondary facility incorporating the teaching spaces, administrative and preparation areas, a library resource area, multi-purpose home economics and science are, ablution facilities and technical studies workshop and resource area. A secondary facility will also be built at Minyerri at a cost of $1m. The proposal is to construct a new secondary facility incorporating teaching spaces, administrative and preparation areas, a library resource area and multi-purpose home economics and science area plus ablution facilities.
The second major project is one that was announced in a Ministerial Statement in 2002. As part of a commitment to implement the recommendations of the Learning Lessons Review, we are committed to support the establishment of four self-managing schools. The Learning Lessons Review identified a need for the establishment of partnerships between indigenous parents, communities, peak representative bodies, service providers, especially health, and both the Northern Territory and Commonwealth governments to identify the causes of declining education outcomes, and assume joint responsibility for immediately reversing the downward trend. The minister recently approved that self-managing schools be referred to as ‘Community Controlled Schools’ to reflect the intention that communities can control the delivery of their education services if they so choose. The four Community Controlled School locations are in the Alyawarra/Anmatjere school cluster and Alcoota schools comprising about eight schools in that cluster, the Warlpiri triangle, which is Lajamanu,. Yuendumu, Willowra and Nyirrpi; Maningrida CEC and the Tiwi Islands.
The Learning Lessons Implementation Steering Committee has considered options for self-managing schools and recommended development of models for community controlled schools. Four major phases are identified for implementation of community controlled schools. Phase one will involve action planning and the preparation. Phase two: community consultation and information sharing. Phase three: negotiation and establishment of school governance bodies; and phase four: governance and continuing evaluation. Community controlled schools are expected to improve attendance and educational outcomes for indigenous students through the greater involvement of indigenous people in education decision-making, the improved coordination of relevant services in communities, and innovation in school programming.
An amount of $1.5m will be provided to the Charles Darwin University in 2003-04 to assist with the establishment of an Institute of Advanced Studies within the university. This increase will bring total support of the university to $6.5m per annum. The additional funding will assist with the establishment of four schools within the institute: the School of Health Research; Research School of Resource and Ecosystem Management; Research School of Energy and Infrastructure; and the School of Governance and Social Policy. The institute will enable the university to improve its research profile and attract and world-class academics, and attract and retain students and researchers from southern universities and research institutions, as well as develop a sound resident capability in research and innovation for its future sustainable development.
I should qualify why Central Australian College was not mentioned in the budget papers. As we know, Centralian College receives all of its Northern Territory funding, for both secondary and VET services, by grants from the Department of Employment, Education and Training. This is the same situation as occurred with the Northern Territory Rural College, the Batchelor Institute of Indigenous and Tertiary Education, and the Northern Territory University, which is soon to be Charles Darwin University. Centralian College does not receive direct appropriations from the Central Holding Authority. This is a situation that has existed for a number of years. The inclusion of Centralian College in Budget Paper No 3 in past years has been for information rather than as a requirement of the Financial Management Act. Consistent with the treatment for other colleges, and the amalgamation of Centralian College with NTU to form the Charles Darwin University, information on Centralian College does not appear in Budget Paper No 3. The consolidated tables for general government in Budget Paper No 2 incorporate the funding for secondary and training functions at Centralian College, as well as the other colleges, in line with ABS requirements.
I turn to the important areas of employment and training. The Treasurer has announced initiatives in this area and, again, it is exciting to see additional resources being allocated for important employment initiatives, such as apprenticeships and a labour market analysis. This is an overall increase to the employment budget of $1.625m and brings the total allocation to $20m.
This government has announced the commissioning of the first comprehensive Northern Territory-wide labour market analysis and forecast study. The study will enable our government to target training in skills shortage areas and for jobs in existing and emerging industries and on major projects. It also enables our government to plan for a skilled workforce that can support local businesses, major projects, and future enterprise development.
In 2003-04, the commitment to workforce planning will continue, with a $0.5m contribution to updating the labour forecast sourced in this year’s first study and by commissioning projects to identify areas of priority in targetted industry sectors for workforce development.
I was pleased to hear the Treasurer announce an extra $1.5 m to fund an expected growth in apprentices, and to increase apprenticeship training programs, particularly in identified skill shortage areas, and $0.5 m has been allocated to develop an Employment Bonus Scheme to benefit small businesses taking on apprentices. I was also pleased to note that $86 000 was allocated to the Footprints Forward office in Alice Springs for support services that will assist indigenous people in Central Australia to find employment. Again, these initiatives demonstrate the Martin Labor government’s commitment to prioritise jobs for Territorians.
Funding of $0.5m has been provided in the 2003-04 Budget to build the capacity of the office of Work Health to improve occupational health and safety in the Territory’s workplaces, and this funding will provide for an additional five staff. An amount of $59.5m has been allocated for training and specifically for vocational education training services for 2003-04. These include $1m to continue the successful Training for Remote Youth, or TRY, initiative, which provides vocational education and training to youth aged between 14 and 19 years living in remote communities; $0.45m for the employment of five regional VET coordinators to build capacity in the regional training centres of Katherine, Tennant Creek, Jabiru, and Nhulunbuy; and $0.25m for a marketing campaign primarily targetted at small businesses, to improve employers’ and participants’ access to information about vocational education and training opportunities. The majority of the training budget is allocated to support our private and public training providers in the Northern Territory who deliver vocational education services.
The non-government education sector represents over 20% of the student population of the Northern Territory and is vital in offering choice in education to our communities. In 2003-04, the Territory Labor government will continue to support recurrent and capital funding arrangements for this sector. This will include continuing to fund the per capita rates based on 21% of the cost of a Northern Territory government student, and a capital and interest subsidy that will cover 50% of the total cost of capital and interest for eligible projects.
I am pleased to see a number of key budget initiatives specifically for the Arafura electorate. I have mentioned the upgrade to the Maningrida School to provide for secondary students. Other funded initiatives for Arafura include a new health centre for Minjilang community, long overdue and certainly not even on the radar of the former CLP government; an upgrade of roads on Melville Island for the forestry project, which will certainly help in terms of economic development on Aboriginal land, jobs; an upgrade of police cells at Gunbalanya and Maningrida to comply with the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody; and an extension to the football oval at Nguiu to minimum AFL requirements and the installation of four flood light towers.
Madam Speaker, this budget is a substantial commitment to improving employment, education and training outcomes for the Northern Territory, despite the negative rhetoric from the other side. It is a budget about jobs. It is a budget about safer communities and tax cuts. I am pleased to commend the budget to parliament.
Mr KIELY (Sanderson): Madam Speaker, I rise to add my support for the third Martin Labor government budget. Members will recall that in November 2001, the Chief Minister and Treasurer advised the Assembly of the parlous state of the Territory’s finances. Who of us will every forget the then Under Treasurer’s observations to the Treasurer that the CLP’s last budget was not what it was purported to be by the member of Katherine and his fellow travellers? The CLP budget for 2001-02 was, the Under Treasurer stated, unsustainable. It is quite amazing when I hear the member for Blain talk about what this government is up to in regard to the budget. He is a man of integrity, the member for Blain, but to hear him try to rewrite the past - and in his naivety, I think he believes he is telling the truth. Instead of interrogating these budget figures, I believe he should go back and have a look at the last CLP budget and really get a grasp on just what state the CLP did leave the Territory in back in those dark, dark days. I think it would be a salutary lesson for him and a few of his fellow travellers.
The government had to make some tough choices for Territorians due to the inept fiscal management strategies that the CLP had employed for many years. This government fronted up to the challenge, and we rightfully introduced a well thought out, structured and strategic deficit reduction strategy. It is a credit to the foresight and strength of the Treasurer at that time that today we have before us a strong, sound budget, which has as its focus job creation and further economic growth, funding to continue the good work done so far in making our communities even more safe and healthy places to live, and further initiatives to reduce the tax burden on families and businesses and make the system more equitable. To the government’s credit, the Northern Territory’s tax regime is the second lowest of all the states and territories.
This budget is really good news for the people of Sanderson. The government has once again demonstrated its commitment to putting the Territory’s financial affairs back in order, and to have the budget back in balance in 2004-05. With this budget, the Territory government has once again brought on a reduction of payroll tax, from 6.3% to 6.2%. In the Sanderson electorate, we have quite a number of people who work in places with greater than 15 employees. It is these businesses that will benefit from this reduction, which will free up cash for them so that they may, if they wish, reinvest and grow the companies, leading to more employment opportunities.
We have continued to keep downward pressure on fuel and domestic power costs for Territory households. The freeze on domestic power prices will continue, as will the fuel subsidy on petrol. This is a significant return to Territory families, and maintains our election promises.
In the November 2001 Mini-budget, the government introduced a Temporary Budget Improvement Levy. The government recognised that the state of the Territory’s finances was a problem for all Territorians, not just one class or one segment of the community. If this problem was to be addressed, it could not be through another tax source, which would aggravate the effects of already high business taxes, further weaken the Territory’s economic base, retard recovery and thus impact on jobs. Such a path would have been foolhardy because it would have put further pressure on jobs. For this reason, the government introduced the $90 vehicle registration levy. We did not do this lightly. We understood the popularity attached to any such budget measures, but there was little choice due to the CLP government’s fabricated figures in what was to be its outgoing budget. The Territory simply had to reduce, then eliminate this fiscal deficit and the structural weakness inherited from the CLP.
I take this opportunity to congratulate the current and previous Martin Cabinet for the rigour they have applied to improving the fiscal position of the Territory for all Territorians. Due to their hard and dedicated work over the last two years and, might I add, in the face of some seemingly insurmountable external pressures, they have improved the fiscal deficit to such a position that we can now lift the Temporary Budget Improvement Levy some 18 months ahead of the anticipated sunset date. The removal of this levy will make Territory motor vehicle registration charges the lowest in Australia for small vehicles, and the second lowest for medium sized vehicles. I behalf of my constituents, I thank the government for this initiative.
This government’s focus is on lifting education standards in the Territory. I welcome the $13.5m boost to education services. The budget contains new initiatives and funding to attract quality teachers to the Territory, and to keep them here. This is welcome news to the parents of Sanderson. In this budget, we have funded the latest Enterprise Bargaining Agreement, something for which the CLP was not renowned. Other initiatives to support teachers in the 2003-04 budget include: $2m to recruit an additional 20 teachers, taking the total number of extra teachers that will be employed in the Territory to 60. This is in line with an election commitment to employ an extra 100 teachers in the government’s first term; $760 000 to provide student teacher bursaries to 60 teaching students from the Territory; continuing to work on establishing a Teacher Registration Board by January 2004; enhancing teacher recruitment strategies through such things as targeted advertising, sponsoring suitably qualified teachers from overseas and identifying students graduating mid-semester; an extra $224 000 to improve living and working conditions for teachers in remote communities.
You might wonder what this has to do with Sanderson, but there are many teachers who live in Sanderson who go out bush because they have friends out there. Sanderson has a high social conscience, and to see this money for the teachers working out on remote communities, helping our communities along is great, something teachers in the Sanderson electorate will appreciate. This money will be used to fund fares out of isolated locations and perishable freight subsidies for teachers and school support employees. I lived out bush, and I know how much the perishable freight subsidy assisted. It is a great thing for teachers; implementing a pilot remote internship program through Sydney University; and providing teachers with greater access to laptops for school and home use under a subsidised leasing scheme - this is quite an innovation, one that it took a change of government to bring about.
As our children grow, we become concerned about what job opportunities might present themselves for our children. Our concerns are only matched by those of our children who are seeking the acquisition of skills so that they may venture forth into the workplace and become independent and contributory members of our community. This is how I felt as a youth and parent, and I do not think I am far off the mark in my belief that this is how a large majority of the parents of Sanderson and the wider Territory feel. In this budget, we recognise these aspirations.
The Territory budget contains around $2m in new initiative funding to support apprentices and enhance their training opportunities. The boost includes $1.5m to meet the demand of an anticipated 24% increase in apprenticeships over the next three years. There are currently more than 2400 apprentices in the Northern Territory. The funds will be used for purchasing on- and off- job training support, providing travel assistance to apprentices having to travel interstate for training, and supporting the administration and management of apprenticeship contracts. The Martin Labor government sees apprentices as a vital section of the workforce, providing business with a skilled workforce. We will give priority to training that is responsive to the needs of business by addressing skill shortage areas and developing work-ready employers.
The budget includes a package for business training. This government is determined to create more jobs in the Territory, and it will do it in this budget, and the next and the next and the next. It is an ongoing plan that we have for the Territory, one of growing the Territory.
This budget sees the removal of the Temporary Budget Improvement Levy, which will help businesses; the reduction of payroll tax, as I mentioned; the creation of the Trade Support Scheme with $330 000 in export grants; our ongoing support for a Defence Support Unit, which, might I say, is something that we really have to get on top of here. There is no doubt that the defence units moving up here are highly specialised technical units and require special skills. They present great opportunities for our businesses. This government has recognised it, this government is funding it, this is a government for future growth, this is a government for now, leading into the future. It is not a regressive, repressive government like the CLP. In his budget reply, you heard the Opposition Leader talk about the grand old days where his main focus was on growing the public sector. He wanted to create 30 more CEOs. Well, that would do a lot for the Territory economy. That would really take us places.
I digress, Madam Speaker, but it is an important point. Even though this is a budget reply, I should mention here that he was on Daryl Manzie’s talkback this morning, and he was talking about being leader, and how he was leading them, and that it was important to have the confidence of the team that follows. He said: ‘I will maintain the confidence of not only my parliamentary colleagues, but the CLP only if I am moving things ahead’. And he said: ‘I am doing this because, most importantly, I know where I went wrong’. He is talking about losing government. He said: ‘Yes, you know, I have been there and I have done that. I will do my very best to say to Territorians, look, where I went wrong, I reckon I have figured it out, where I went wrong. But I know that I can do something for this Northern Territory that I never really had a chance to get into before, but I want to do it’.
Well, let me tell you: he had a chance, and look where we ended up. We ended up with the biggest debt. We were living on a Bankcard economy in which all our money was going to pay off the interest. They used up all the capital. Then he gets his Bankcard and says: ‘I will buy this, and then, because I only have so much cash, I will just pay off the interest’. Then he buys the Territory’s groceries the next week, and he cranks it up again until, in the end, all the income that we have is going to pay the interest bill. I lived like that as an 18 year old when I left home because I could not budget, but I had access to a Bankcard, and by gees, I had a ripping time. But in a year or so, I was on the bones of me bottom. That is where this Opposition Leader wants to take us again. He wants us to relive our youth. He is saying: ‘Come with me, bring your Bankcards. We will charge them up, and perhaps we can find someone to pay it off for us later’. That is the CLP’s vision for the future. Well, I had that when I was 18, and when I look back, I did not enjoy it one iota. Territorians look back at it, and they will not enjoy it one iota. They know; they have his measure.
Then he carped on, because he was losing it a little bit with Daryl, about the depth of the party. He has depth so he has to keep on his toes. Well, the responses that I saw to the budget from the opposition - and I am sure the Treasurer will be far more edifying than I - I would say: ‘Denis, you have the job for life’. They are shallower than a pool out in the mud flats at the end of the Dry Season. I tell you what: I think they have about the brains of the life forms you find in it.
I am sorry, it is so easy to get carried away when you think about these lads, and they are lads. They manage the budget. Yes, yes, yes.
Madam SPEAKER: Could we get back to your budget speech?
Mr KIELY: I shall, Madam Speaker. I apologise for digressing.
This budget announced initiatives to break the cycle of crime with a particular emphasis on reducing re-offending and over-representation of indigenous people in custody.
This government has committed an additional $1.4m in the 2003-04 budget to continue to implement its commitment of increasing police establishment numbers by 50 officers in the first term. Additionally, recurrent funding of $3m has been allocated in the budget to rectify identified under-funding of personnel support for police, providing for more effective support of operational police. I believe that the police minister and the Treasurer addressed those points in Question Time. I do not have to go back over those, and they will be revisited, I should imagine, a number of times over the next few sittings because it is as much to the ever-lasting shame of the smoke and mirrors of the CLP, who still parrot out that we have all these police numbers, who know the fraud that they perpetrated about this.
In the area of capital works for police, the government will improve and expand on police service to the community. How good is it: $1.4m for construction of a new Police, Fire and Emergency Services facility in Humpty Doo, providing a more effective service for rural residents and easing the pressure on resources in Palmerston? Yet two speakers ago, we had the member for Blain saying: ‘Oh, there is nothing being done for Palmerston. Poor, poor me. You do not live there’. What is this? Why doesn’t he look at the budget and tell the people of the Territory the truth? $300 000 for stage two of the capital works upgrade for the Mounted Police - and they do a tremendous job, particularly on the Esplanade.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Sanderson, this way! Talk to me, not to the opposition.
Mr KIELY: How good is that? That is a marvellous thing. You see the Mounted Police getting around, it is a great sight - good for tourism, good for antisocial behaviour, it is a feel-good service that they provide.
Here is something which may not seem too sexy to a lot of people, but the NT police have also been allocated $1.5m to upgrade and maintain their computer system, PROMIS.
I know police officers who really want something done with this PROMIS system. They have been on about it for years. It was rolled out by the CLP, but what happened? They rolled it out, gave them a screen, called up a couple of data pages, and that is it. Well, it is not it. The member for Macdonnell, an ex-policeman, knows the faults and limitations of PROMIS. He knows it chews up the labour of police at the video screen and the input of data. We are going to fix that, and we are going to make it work. That will give us more operational time for police, and that is what the police want; that is what the people want. This is the fabulous thing about this budget; it covers the whole scope. It is wonderful that it goes right down into data systems.
There are initiatives for safer communities. In this package, we also have $5.25m to address itinerant antisocial behaviour in all major Territory centres; $2.36m to operate the Office of Crime Prevention across the Territory; $520 000 to break the cycle of crime for a new Integrated Offender Management program; $180 000 to promote a greater level of indigenous community input into the courts; $200 000 for the Alice in 10 strategy to address antisocial behaviour in Alice Springs; and $300 000 for drugs courts.
This government’s concern for safer communities is being emulated …
Mr Elferink interjecting.
Mr KIELY: Is being emulated, member for Macdonnell, who finds safer communities somewhat amusing.
Mr Elferink interjecting.
Mr KIELY: All the member for Macdonnell manages to do is keep the camel population down.
Madam SPEAKER: Would you keep to your speech, member for Sanderson.
Mr KIELY: I do not know what sort of crime they commit, but he inflicts the capital punishment on the camels. I guess he sees himself as doing the job.
We are looking at safer communities and we are tackling it in this budget. We are taking it right up to those who engage in antisocial behaviour, but we not doing it in a monster-stomping sense. We are looking to integrate people into the community and for them to adopt the community’s social values. We are not looking to ostracise individuals; we are looking to show them how the alternative life can be better. That is how we will achieve a longer term effect. That is the nature of our social justice policy, not lock them up, hide them, monster and stomp them, as was the practice of the CLP. That is where they want to take us back to, with this rear vision view of the world.
I mentioned the itinerants program, but I did not get a chance to mention the role of the Larrakia people. Now, as far as the Host program, the elders’ strategies and Return to Country, I went down and met with the elders when they came in the other day. We were sitting in the Larrakia office near the airport. They are visionary in what they want to do, and they will do it. They are not coming cap in hand to government; we are working in partnership with them because we can see results. It is a very well thought out organisation, Larrakia. They have been here for a long, long time and they know what goes on. I am very confident, and so are a lot of the people in my electorate, which borders the airport, so we have our itinerants. There is a big difference between itinerants and alcoholics - huge difference. Not everyone who is an itinerant is an alcoholic. Not everyone who is itinerant engages in antisocial behaviour. We are not just casting some net to drag everyone in. What we are looking at doing is talking to the community of itinerants and getting it sorted out and removing that bad element, one way or another. That is what this government is about. That is what is enshrined in this budget. That is where this budget will take us.
The member for Macdonnell was going on the other day about interpreters because he has this mind set about itinerants and we know what that is code for in his mind. Let me talk about interpreters. There has been a recent audit of registered interpreters, and any interpreter who has not been used for six months or more has been archived. This is reflected in the low numbers in the budget estimates. They can be reactivated when needed, member for Macdonnell. So, you know, ask a few questions; you will get the right answers. The process for making bookings has been streamlined. The two major service users, the courts and hospitals, now have a roster system in place. Previously, bookings were made on an ad hoc basis. The interpreter is booked on a roster, remains for a week and is counted as one booking – one week; one booking. Do you want me to write that down for you, member for Macdonnell? One week; one booking. Got that? This is a more efficient means, which is another feature of this government. We do not just chuck money at things; we look for more efficiencies.
Mr Elferink interjecting.
Mr KIELY: So, this is a more efficient means. It also impacts on the bookings anticipated, as reported in the budget papers. It is not a reduction in service, member for Macdonnell.
Mr Elferink: This is the problem when you deliver someone else’s speech, Len.
Madam SPEAKER: Order! Order!
Mr KIELY: Well, you ask the questions. If you want the answers, sit there and listen to them. But if you don’t, then don’t come across as some caring and concerned person when the fact is that you did not even invite one person from your electorate to the parliament in Alice Springs. did you, member for Macdonnell?
Mr Elferink interjecting.
Mr KIELY: Not one person. To your great shame, the people you represent, you will live with that shame.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Sanderson, would you address your remarks to me?
Mr KIELY: Yes, Madam Speaker. Of course.
Madam SPEAKER: And keep to your budget speech.
Mr KIELY: Yes, Madam Speaker. We are looking at record Health and Community Services spending. We had to put up with that tepid little tirade from the member for Port Darwin who trotted out her Alice Springs speech.
Dr Toyne: Anything about rubber gloves?
Mr KIELY: Yes. I take her point about gloves because they are important things in infection control when you are making beds, and if you get the sheets wrong, the old matrons will really be on your hammer. I think she had a point there. I would not take that away from her. I thought there were more issues in health than rubber gloves, but they are important and we should not deride for her stance on rubber gloves and soap that does not foam up when you want it to.
Mr Elferink interjecting.
Mr KIELY: This budget has committed a record $561m. Let me say that again: a record $561m to the Health and Community Services budget. That is an increase from last year of over $14m. The minister for Health delivered a brilliant budget speech and answered, put to bed, a lot of the niggly little questions that were coming not only from the member for Port Darwin, but that old has-been health minister, the member for Drysdale. He could not handle it as a minister, could not handle it as a shadow, and they made him Business. By golly, some people get it easy for a shadow minister position, member for Drysdale.
Madam SPEAKER: You are doing it again. Keep to your speech.
Mr KIELY: All right, Madam Speaker, yes..
The budget, as I understand it, for Health is going to be broken down as follows: Acute Services will get $320.614m; Community Health Services near on $99m; Family and Children’s Services, let’s round it up to $37.5m; Aged and Disability Services near on $46m; Mental Health near on $19m; Public Health Services near on $35m; and Health Research, $4.219m.
The highlights for Health are: additional funding of $3.6m for the new emergency department, intensive care units and operating theatres at Royal Darwin Hospital; $1.57m for employing more nurses; $900 00 for the first stage of a major upgrade in Mental Health Services, something that has been sorely needed for some time, something that the health minister has taken to Cabinet, has well represented her needs. Actually, she has been doing a bonza job in Cabinet, much to the chagrin of the other Cabinet members to have her roll in there with her suitcases full of files and take them on and come out a winner. I congratulate her for her stance in Cabinet. I think she is doing a fabulous job in the health portfolio. As an example of that, let us have a look at what she has done for the expansion of renal services. Who would ever forget that pathetic little Lateline show on which the ex-minister for health appeared a couple of years ago? It was a shocker. Renal problems in Tennant Creek? Oh, no. Oh no, he said, in his tired and emotional state. We know about that now, don’t we?
We are expanding renal services to Palmerston, to Elcho Island and Groote Eylandt and we will keep going. Indigenous Territorians have a right to access suitable medical treatment. Unfortunately, due to the chronic nature of renal illness, people are having to leave their communities and travel into regional centres for prolonged periods. This will go a long way to helping those people in our communities. I commend the government for their foresight, and I commend the Health minister particularly for her strength and fortitude, I daresay ably supported by our bush members in Cabinet. Good luck to them for that.
Mr Elferink: Hear, hear! That’s got you stuffed: I agreed with you, didn’t I?
Mr KIELY: The member for Greatorex – oh, I might even get an extension, member for Macdonnell. Who knows? It is such a good budget, I could go all night on this.
Madam SPEAKER: No, you won’t.
Mr KIELY: Madam Speaker, the member for Greatorex was carrying on about not caring for people in public housing. Funny, you know, in all the times I watched previous budgets from the CLP, I never heard anything about security screening. Did not hear anything about that. No. Well, you hear it now.
A public housing program of $93.2m plus $26.1m for indigenous housing. How fabulous is that for the people of the Territory? This program will include $25m for capital works in urban public housing and government employee housing in rural and remote areas; $17.4m for repairs and maintenance; $26.1m in NT funding contributions for indigenous housing through IHANT programs; and continuation of the HomeStart and Home Share loan; and let us not forget the tax breaks when purchasing new homes, something that we are committed to, something that is …
Mr Elferink interjecting.
Mr KIELY: I did not even catch that little bit of mumble. The member for Macdonnell’s comments make no sense. Last night, he said there is some sort of blow-out in the Department of Community Development, Sport and Cultural Affairs. His comments made no sense because if he took the time to consider the massive improvements in the budget deficit and the sustainability of Northern Territory finances since this government came to office, he would know how much we are putting into that portfolio.
Madam SPEAKER: Do note the time: you are on the way out.
Mr KIELY: I would like to pick up on one other point that the members for Macdonnell and Port Darwin raised about Arts and Museums. This is a fun government, as can be seen by the things that we are doing at Litchfield, the Casuarina foreshore. We are looking after lifestyle. If you would take the time to read the budget properly and desist from making trite observations to inflame Territory people, because you don’t know what you’re talking about …
This is a great budget. I commend it to the people of Sanderson, the people of the Territory. I am proud to be part of it, and I am sure that the Territory will be a real winner.
Debate adjourned.
SPECIAL ADJOURNMENT
Mr HENDERSON (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly adjourn until Tuesday 17 June 2003 at 10am or such other time and/or date as may be set by Madam Speaker pursuant to standing orders.
Motion agreed to.
ADJOURNMENT
Mr HENDERSON (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly do now adjourn.
I speak tonight about a fantastic event hosted by Wanguri Primary School in my electorate where, as part of an ongoing series of events to commemorate Anzac Day in schools across our northern suburbs, Wanguri Primary held its first Anzac Day Memorial Ceremony on Thursday 24 April.
It was a very moving occasion, and one which the children thoroughly enjoyed. I was very pleased, as local member, to host the Chief Minister, the members for Karama and Sanderson, the former Administrator of the Northern Territory, Austin Asche and Dr Valerie Asche, other dignitaries and armed forces personnel. Staff and students helped Territorians remember the valour and the sacrifices of previous generations in defence of our country. This was the inaugural Northern Suburbs Schools Anzac Day Service, and was a culmination of many months of preparation. A feature of the commemoration was the raising of the flag by a full military Catafalque Party. The students had worked very long and hard preparing for the day, and had spent a lot of time studying the history of our Anzacs.
I was pleased to pass on to the school library a biography of Alec Campbell, our last Anzac, who died earlier this year in Tasmania, the last living link that we as a nation had with the original Anzacs on that fateful day when they landed at Anzac Cover in Turkey. The book is an amazing story about an amazing man and the last link back to those eventful and tragic days 88 years ago.
I pay particular tribute to Sue Neil who did a huge amount of work, and was instrumental in organising the event; all the teachers and students who put so much work into the day, they did a fantastic job. It was a defining moment for Wanguri Primary School, one that will live in the memories of those children for many years to come.
I am pleased to report on another significant event in my electorate on 11 May. Along with my colleagues, the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, the member for Karama and the Minister for Tourism, I attended Buddhist Society celebrations of Vesak. Honouring an election commitment that I made as local member in Wanguri, I handed over a cheque for $200 000 to the Buddhist Society for their multipurpose hall, for which they have been fundraising so diligently for many years. The Buddhist Society is an important and welcome member of the Darwin community, and has a diverse membership, with the largest groups coming from the Thai, Lao, Vietnamese, Chinese and Sri Lankan communities.
The message of the Buddha stands today unaffected by time and the expansion of knowledge as when they were first enunciated. The teaching of the Buddha is a great civilising force. It appeals to reason and freedom of thought, recognising the dignity and potentiality of the human mind. It calls for equality, fraternity and understanding, exhorting its followers to avoid evil, to do good and to purify their minds.
I was pleased to deliver on the election commitment, and presented the cheque for $200 000 to Mr George Tint, the President of the Buddhist Society. It will allow the Buddhist Society to complete their community hall, and I recognise that my colleague, the member for Casuarina was also present to hand over that cheque. The Buddhist Society has already contributed half the cost of funding this project. This is not just a government hand-out in total. The community has worked very hard, for many years, and the hall is half complete. This will allow them to complete it. The great news is that the multipurpose hall is not just to be available for the Buddhist community; it will be available for all community groups to use, and will become a great community asset in the northern suburbs. I am very pleased to be a part of that community.
I acknowledge the contribution of the many people who helped to get the building to its present state: Richard Phang of Alawa; Prasad Senaratne of Woodleigh Gardens, for project management; Percy Wijenaike of Nightcliff, who has done a lot of the work; Steven Tam of Woodleigh Gardens, who has done a lot of the electrical works; Lalith Ramachandra of Wanguri, who has contributed to a lot of the building works; and Vipul de Silva, formerly of Jingili, now in Sydney, who has done a lot of the technical work. Other members of the community have given of their time as and when needed, and a lot of the fund-raising has come from food nights where members of those communities sell wonderful and diverse food to the people of the northern suburbs. I wish the Buddhist community continued success in making the Northern Territory a wonderful and harmonious place to live.
Mr Deputy Speaker, last weekend I was very pleased to attend a dinner at the Transport Workers Union Federal Council meeting in Darwin. The Transport Workers Union came back after 10 years to hold their National Federal Council meeting in Darwin from 19 to 23 April. Over 70 delegates and their spouses from around Australia attended, and it was very pleasant to be among union colleagues who talk about issues that are affecting transport workers across Australia.
The federal council is the peak governing body for the Transport Workers Union. Unlike their last meeting here 10 years ago, where we had many eloquent stories about having to mop up the blood from the floor from some very intense debate, it was a very harmonious meeting, and a lot of strategies are being pursued to improve the lot of transport workers across Australia. The TWU has been a stakeholder in the Northern Territory for many years. Alex Gallacher, the TWU SA/NT Secretary, has been a great friend to Territorians and the Territory union movement for many years. He is a very capable secretary and is building the union and its membership in the Northern Territory.
One of the things I found fascinating about this federal council meeting was the number of employers who attended the whole meeting. I had the pleasure of sitting next to one employer from South Australia who employs dozens of transport workers. He stated, even as a lifelong Liberal voter, he always ensured that his workers were signed up to the TWU because he wanted to engage in a constructive relationship with his workforce, to have structures to work for collective bargaining to ensure the best outcome for his employees; and to develop a relationship with the union so that as and when issues do arise, they can be worked through in a structured and harmonious way. For many years, they have had no industrial disputes. He said the best thing he ever did in terms of his business was to encourage a good working relationship between the union movement, his workers, and his management staff. It really was a pleasure to hear that coming from a business person. There were half a dozen other business people who attended that federal council meeting, some from Darwin. I was quite surprised, I am not going to name the companies here in Darwin, but they have a very productive relationship with the TWU.
I would like to mention Mr Brian McIntosh, who received an award for outstanding service for 25 years to the Transport Workers Union and 36 years as a member. He joined the union as a member on 8 March 1967. He was an organiser from 10 April 1978 to 10 April 1990; a branch industrial research officer from 1993 to 2003, and focussed on South Australia and Northern Territory during that time. For Brian, a 36-year contribution to the Transport Workers Union, an enormous and constructive input to the union movement over those years. I wish Brian and his wife well, and I certainly wish the Transport Workers Union well for their continuing representation of workers in that industry.
Mr ELFERINK (Macdonnell): Mr Deputy Speaker, for the information of ministers opposite, I should not be too long. However, I am glad to see that the police minister is in the Chamber this evening because my comments tonight apply to his portfolio areas.
As members would be aware, Operation Gene Sweep was run by the Northern Territory police using DNA evidence to secure arrests of particular villains whose genetic material had turned up at various offences around the traps. I congratulate the police on excellent work, as I congratulate both governments - the current and prior ones - for introducing legislation to make operations like Gene Sweep possible.
However, there is one aspect of Operation Gene Sweep that I cannot forbear to mention. It is in relation to something that recently came to my attention, specifically in relation to how the operation itself was conducted or, more to the point, what occurred immediately prior to the operation.
It seems that in certain matters cleared up by Gene Sweep, we had positive DNA tests prior to the operation going ahead, and that positive results were being returned some months prior to the operation going ahead. There may well be operational reasons for this occurring; however, I am concerned that, where you have a positive result on a DNA test - which means that you have a name of a person but you decline to go and see that person because an operation is coming up, and it would look better for the operation if it produced better numbers - this person is not pursued by the police and allowed to remain at large. This is a concern for two reasons. One is if the DNA result comes in reasonably quickly subsequent to the offence occurring and if that person is in possession of some property, one would hope that there is a quick response to pursue that person and, hopefully, retrieve and return the property. Also, in many instances, the people who commit house breaks are serial housebreakers. Rarely do they commit one or two; they normally rattle off a whole stream of them. I would be concerned that, for statistical purposes, those people were allowed to remain at large.
This is an inquiry. It is not an attack on the police force and government. The information I have received may be incomplete. Indeed, I qualify what I have to say here tonight with that observation. However, I do raise it because I think it is an important issue. If it is correct, it is an issue about which the public needs to be aware. As I said, I am glad the police minister is here to listen to my comments.
As I understand it, the instructions came down from somewhere substantially above operational police. I hope that the pursuit of statistical outcomes was not the reason that files and suspects were allowed to go unchecked prior to Operation Gene Sweep.
Mr VATSKALIS (Casuarina): Mr Deputy Speaker, it has been a tiring, long, but absolutely interesting week. What was most interesting was the lacklustre performance of the opposition and, certainly, the performance of the Leader of the Opposition who wants to position himself as the continuous leader despite the dark clouds gathering around him. Information I have received from a senior member of the Country Liberal Party indicates that a leadership challenge is not a matter of if it will happen, but when it will happen.
However, as you probably read in the newspaper, there has been a Liberal Party gallop poll taking place, something the CLP accused us of doing, but the truth is out there: the Liberal Party in Canberra doing some galloping. I would not be surprised if there are some very interesting developments in the next few days. The Leader of the Opposition has given a very interesting performance in the past few days, beating his chest, trying to prove that he is going to be the Leader of the Opposition, hence his performance.
Of course, he would not let the truth spoil a good story. He started with how few tenders are advertised in the NT News every week. I did a bit of research this afternoon and I discovered that in April, there were 85 tenders worth $19.6m. It gets better. In May, we had 128 tenders to date, and the value is $20.5m. So we are not doing too badly: in two months, nearly $40m out there for work for the little and big people. We must be doing really well.
The other thing is that in newspapers on Thursdays every so often, we advertise future tender opportunities. We are talking about multi-million dollar tenders about which we forewarn business, something the Country Liberal Party never did. The only people they notified were their mates - pick up the phone and give them orders to construct a new prison without anyone else knowing about it. Why should they know? I mean, let’s face it, they are our mates, we have to help them. The truth about tenders is out there for everybody to see.
This morning I had breakfast with the TCA to advise them about our budget. The comments we received from the person in charge of the TCA - and if I remember, Mr Michael Kilgariff was some time ago a CLP candidate – were very positive, commending the budget. The Past President of TCA, Mr Neil Sommers, gave us a very good rap, and especially highlighted the fact that this budget is providing for the middle-sized businesses, the ones that construct projects between $3-10m, which means it will put food on the table for the small and middle level subbies and companies.
I was very encouraged about it because it is a small town, and I know a lot of people involved in the construction industry. A lot of Greeks, Italians and Chinese are involved in the construction industry and I have felt very uncomfortable in the past three years meeting them, and listening to them whingeing and complaining - and quite rightly - about the lack of work. So I was very pleased and proud to be at the TCA and hear these people, the same people who a few years ago were complaining bitterly about what was happening here, the same people who were leaving the Territory to go to Adelaide or Perth to find a job, telling me that they are very happy, that there is a lot of work out there. As a matter of fact, if you are trying to do some renovations now, don’t bother. I don’t think you will be able to find any tradesmen to come and do any decent renovations to your house.
It is not only about the construction industry. Let us have a look at roads, a significant part of the Territory. We have consulted the Cattlemen’s Association and the people working out on the stations and farms. We have heard what they said, and we put money into cattle roads, the roads that make money for the Territory. Yesterday, I was advised by my wife to listen to the Country Hour, and we received very favourable comments from people working in remote communities of the Territory - the first time I have heard it on the Country Hour - saying that this Labor government has done something really good, put real money into roads that service their stations and farms. That is a plus for us because, to put it bluntly, farmers and station owners were never Labor supporters. At least they have the decency, courage and the guts to say that we have done something very good.
That brings me to the Victoria Highway bridge. You recall some months ago, there was a number of tourists stuck out there for about four or five weeks because, as we know, the Victoria Highway bridge goes under water for a few weeks every year. This year, it was under about 10 metres of water. I brought that matter to the attention of John Anderson, the Deputy of Prime Minister and Minister for Transport. Thanks to Mr Anderson, he provided $200 000 for a survey to be conducted for flood immunity of the bridge, a bridge that connects the two states, the Territory and Western Australia - vital for the interstate trade. In the future, when the railway comes to Darwin, it will be vital for the transport of goods from the Ord River system to Katherine and then down south or to the north for export.
I met Mr Anderson recently at the Transport Ministers’ Council, and I personally thanked him for the Highway Bridge Flood Immunity Study, and I mentioned, conveniently, that the Territory misses out every year on about $20m because we do not have local government, and Roads to Recovery funds are given directly by the federal government to local government. Mr Anderson said he acknowledged that there is a problem. He said he admitted he did not know how to resolve it, and my suggestion was that he should treat the Territory the same way he treats it under the National Heritage Trust program. He said that was a good idea. He invited me to write to him officially and to make the suggestion, then he will look at how to resolve the issue for this $20m that can go to regional roads to provide better sealing for these roads and to do something about it. I have asked my department to draft an appropriate letter, which will be going very soon, and, fingers crossed, we will see some results – something the previous government never, ever did. I must admit some of the ministers I know personally admitted they tried to speak to Mr Anderson, but they never came up with a sensible solution.
Talking about highways, the federal government wrote to us on 14 May to advise that this year they are going to allocate $30m. That was advised after we had compiled all the budget figures and put them in the book, so it was too late to do something about changing it.
The member for Katherine referred to a figure of $27.3m that was at page 283 of Budget Paper No 3. This afternoon, I advised the Chamber that the Territory will spend $30.5m, and it looked like we are putting $3m in for national highways. That was an erroneous statement. I was relying upon the $27.3m that was in Budget Paper No 3, and I assumed there would be an extra $3m. The reality is that there will be $30m given to the Territory by the federal government, and we will be putting every single dollar of this $30m into national highways in order to keep them in their very good state, because they are vital to tourism and trade. I apologise to members of the House if I gave them the wrong impression.
I turn now to statements made by the member for Greatorex. I have to admit, I was a little worried during the week about the member for Greatorex. He did not speak; usually he is very exuberant and vocal. This week, I was worried about his health, but I think he must be worried about his political future, seeing the news I received from Alice Springs is that there might be another person preselected to represent Greatorex in the future.
A member interjecting.
Mr VATSKALIS: No, no! It is better, it is Alderman Jenny Mostran. That is the name floating around Alice Springs. I find it surprising because I am very fond of the member for Greatorex. I mean, we share a non-English speaking background; we were not born here, and I would hate to see a person of non-English speaking background losing his seat, but we do not know what the CLP big knives are going to decide. Hopefully, he will survive any political assassination attempt, and we will be happy to see him here next elections. There is a future as an Independent in Greatorex, you never know. You might finish as the Speaker of the House, and I will be very proud of it - after a Greek, a Chinese. What more could we want for the Territory?
However, I am very disappointed. Despite the fact that a couple of times he referred to me as absent, I was absent, but I was sitting out there listening very carefully to what he was saying. He was referring to a very unfortunate incident about a tax driver who went to the MVR in Alice Springs and was told that his licence had expired and the would not renew it. I sincerely apologise to that person. It was not true. The person at MVR provided the wrong advice. However, we are trying to speak to that person - unsuccessfully, I might add. I make a call to that person, if he is listening tonight, or if he wants information, to contact the MVR and the matter will be resolved straight away. We are all human beings. We all make mistakes, and someone obviously did. However, mistakes can be corrected, and we apologise for the inconvenience. I am prepared to personally apologise for the mistake to the driver. I invite him to contact the MVR again, and the issue will be rectified.
On the other hand, I am very disappointed because the member for Greatorex he makes various statements about taxis. Yesterday he said that private hire cars are going to pay $3000, $4500 and $6000, but then the people in Darwin have been told they are going to pay $2000. Obviously, he misunderstood. I would like to make clear in this House that private hire cars will remain as private hire cars; they will have a mobile phone, they are going to be allowed to use it. My statement in the House was pretty clear, and sad categorically that they will be allowed to use the mobile phone for direct contact either with their base or with their clients and …
Dr Lim: How many backflips have you done?
Mr VATSKALIS: Yes, I will come to that - and the limousine owners will pay $2000. The member for Greatorex might say that I have done backflips, and I publicly stated that I would not hesitate to take another one if it is going to help the industry. The problem is the member for Greatorex did not do any backflips, even when he knew that these were not good for the industry. All these years, he made two speeches only in support of changes in the industry. The industry was going down, the Titanic was going down, and he was saying: ‘What a beautiful view with this iceberg on the horizon’. That was the problem. You have to admit that sometimes you have to go back and listen to the industry and admit that things are not right, and you have to be prepared, you have to be brave enough, you have to have political courage to say: ‘No, I am going to fix it, and I do not care if the other side of the House are going to tell me I did a backflip’.
I am very happy to say that we listen to the industry, we listen to their concerns, we address their concerns and, as a result, there is definitely silence in the media about private hire cars, taxis and limousines. It is going to get better, and I suggest that you listen to the radio over the next few days; you are going to listen to more and better news about the taxi industry.
It is disappointing that people are prepared to stand up and make statements with little knowledge. I will be very happy to provide you with an extensive briefing on the issue, if you could only bother to come and talk to us. However, it is easier to score political points in the House. It looks really good when you tell people in the industry that you fought for them, but the reality is you do not achieve anything. It would be better if you worked with us cooperatively and tried to find out what is happening in the taxi industry - or any other issue, namely Hornsby, or some of the public housing that we have sold and we has been renovated and is the talk of the town in Alice Springs. I would be very happy to provide an extensive briefing to you. You are always welcome to contact my office. I am prepared to sit down with you personally to provide you with a briefing. I invite you to do that, but once again, I am very disappointed about the way the member for Greatorex approaches this issue.
In conclusion, I have had an interesting week. I was very proud to be part of this team that delivered an excellent budget, and I was very proud to go out there and listen to the Chamber of Commerce, the Property Council and the Territory Construction Association saying what a great budget it is. What have we heard from the other side? Doom and gloom. What about the tenants?
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Honourable member, your time has expired.
Dr LIM (Greatorex): Mr Deputy Speaker, in response to the minister’s comments about the commercial passenger vehicle industry, I do not know who the minister has been communicating with, but obviously not the people I have been talking to, people who have a fairly significant stake in the CPV industry. Anyway, it looks like the minister is finally getting his act together. I look forward to seeing his paperwork in the very near future, and if the minister is serious about offering me a briefing, I will endeavour to secure that for this coming Monday afternoon if that is possible.
What I want to talk about tail docking. I heard the minister on radio say the other day that he would love to see his dog wag its tail. I am not sure what the minister meant by that, whether he wanted to wag the dog’s tail, or his tail is being wagged by some dog, or whatever. Before the minister goes down south to talk to his colleagues about tail docking, and before he makes a decision as to whether tail docking should be outlawed in the Northern Territory, there are many issues that he needs to consider.
First let me say that I am the Patron of the Alice Springs Kennel Club, and I have been the Patron of that club for almost 10 years. The club is active; it provides a venue for dog breeders to have their pedigree animals judged by national and international judges on many show days through the year. They are associated with the Northern Australia Kennel Association.
There are significant issues that the minister must consider before he decides one way or another. I suggest that he consults widely, talks to the breeders association and the kennel clubs in the Territory before he embarks on a course that might cause him a lot of grief.
What is tail docking, first of all? Let us ask that.
Dr Burns: Inhumane.
Dr LIM: I pick up that interjection from the Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries. It is inhumane. He gets up …
Dr Burns: Well, that is what the Australian Veterinary Association says.
Dr LIM: He utters that without a thought in his head. He is a PhD, mind you; supposed to be a very intellectual person who has done lots of research, and he utters a blanket statement without due consideration of the facts.
Dr Burns: Well, I have. The Australian Veterinary Association is against it. What do you have to say about that?
Dr LIM: Let me tell you what tail docking is …
Dr Burns: And the RSPCA.
Dr LIM: The docking of tails in a dog is a practice which has been carried out for centuries in order to avoid damage to the animal, and for hygiene and other reasons.
Dr Burns interjecting.
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!
Dr LIM: If you took sheep, for instance; in Australia, lambs are tailed at birth because of potential of the lamb, eventually becoming a sheep, becoming fly blown. In England, where the fly situation is nowhere near what we have here, lambs are not tailed; they are left alone. If you go to sheep farms in England, the lambs and the sheep have tails. That is the reason why animals get their tails docked.
Certain breeds of dogs have their tails docked. Other breeds do not. Therefore, we need to understand why certain dogs have their tails docked. It has nothing to do with unjustified - the word unjustified - alleged by people such as the RSPCA.
Let me let me go further about tail docking so the minister will take some points on board before he makes the decision, rather than just listening to one side of the lobby without considering the other side of the equation. It is important to understand both sides of the equation. There are over 50 dog breeds, and I seek leave to have a list of dog breeds incorporated in Hansard, and will provide a copy to the attendants shortly.
Leave granted.
[Editor’s note: See Annexure A]
Dr LIM: In fact, there are 62 dog breeds, and it would take too long for me to read them all. These are the only dogs docked; others are not.
How is docking carried out? There are two methods of doing it. You can do it by using a technique called banding, where you use a ligature - normally an orthodontic band - which is placed in a position on the puppy’s tail when it is between a day to four days old. This effectively cuts off the blood supply to the tail like a tourniquet, and the tail then drops off. If you went to a vet, most vets would do it by using a pair of sharp scissors and cutting it at the appropriate length. There is generally no need for stitches; very rarely is there any bleeding, but occasionally in larger breeds, of course, that might happen.
When you talk about docking being cruel; is it cruel? Docking is carried out, as I said, when the puppies are between a day to four days old. Their eyes are not yet open, and long experience has indicated that, carried out correctly, the procedures cause very minimal pain or discomfort since most newborn puppies have yet to develop the nervous system fully in their tails. Indeed, through experience, some will tell you that some puppies can be docked while asleep and not be woken. That is how simple the procedure can be, done properly. After docking, the puppies are returned to their dam, the mother of the dog, and continue to feed without any hassles.
I have tailed lambs with my father-in-law when he was running a sheep farm down in South Australia. I know how it is done. Yes, the lambs do suffer a little bit of pain either when you put the ligature on it or cut the tail off. Within less than a day, there are no difficulties. However, when a puppy has grown or is a full grown dog, doing anything to the tail is a real problem.
So why do we need to dock tails at all? The reason is because the breeds that are docked are the types of dogs that tend to go to ground, to damage their tails because of the use to which those dogs are put. Dogs that are hunters, dogs that go into burrows, these are the dogs that could damage their tails. Run through a briar bush waving your arm left, right and centre and see what happens. Your arm will be cut to shreds. Similarly, a dog tail would be cut to shreds and that is a problem.
Smaller dogs, like the terrier, will go into a burrow chasing little animals. An undocked terrier would have a long tail that would jag into the roof of the burrow and cannot come out. Its tail is fractured by the roof of the burrow, not only causing it to snag into the dirt, but also a very painful point. People laugh about it, but if they were serious, if they understood the reason why tails are docked, that is the reason.
A member: This is very serious.
Dr Burns: It is serious, actually, it is a big issue. An unusual position.
Dr LIM: Obviously, the member for Johnston does not understand that.
Dr Burns: I have read the editorial from the Australian Veterinary Association about it. They oppose it. Have you read it?
Mr Mills: What about you guys? You are you against it, are you?
Dr Burns: For sure. That’s my own position.
Dr LIM: It is important to understand that docking is in fact not cruel. Docking is to prevent a mature animal from hurting itself. Let us go to the example of an Australian Terrier, and I will describe that in more detail. The tail presents a target. The terrier is a hunter of vermin and because it is a hunter for vermin, its tail presents itself as a target for rats and snakes. The dog has shaggy fur, which makes a bigger target. When a vermin tries to bite the hair that is hanging down the belly, it bites air, it does not injure the animal, whereas the tail can be caught. Now, the tail has a distinct shape. It is as thick as your hand around the base of the animal and tapers off to a thin point. At about four inches from the backside is its weakest point, and that is the point that tends to be damaged were it to burrow into a hole and then try to reverse out. The tail will snap at that weak point. Then how do you get the dog out? You have to dig it out. There is no other way. You have to dig it out.
Dr Burns: Forceps delivery.
Dr LIM: The member for Johnston mocks. I hope the dog breeders of the Northern Territory hear his comments and interpret how he feels about the pedigree, dearly loved animals of these people who spend so much of their time, their lives, caring for their beloved pets.
It is a very important issue and must be considered in the full context of why tail docking has been practised throughout the centuries, since human beings have been involved with dogs. Think back to when docking first started. It was because the hunter and his dog encountered difficulties when the dog went to ground. Learning through experience, the hunter decided that the tail docking was necessary, and it has passed through the generations. That has to be taken into consideration.
A Schipperke is a dog that has a full dock. The original dogs did not have tails. When this occurs naturally, the dog is highly prized. But what happened was the tail came into the dog when some people randomly bred it. They mixed it. Mass produced, if I can describe it that way, crossing them with Pomeranians. Because of that, these dogs now have tails. If you have a pure bred Schipperke, it does not have a tail. Unfortunately, because of contamination through the generations of this dog, some are born with tails, and those tails need to be lopped off to bring it back to its natural state.
There are issues. I am not saying that we should support it one way or another, but there is significant information that the Minister for Local Government must take with him. I am happy to provide him with a full copy of the notes I have so he can look at them and consider them in detail, having a balanced view of the issue, talk to the people in the kennel clubs, from the Northern Australia Kennel Association, before he embarks on a course that will cause them …
Dr Burns: Do you support tail docking?
Dr LIM: Well, in the last 30 second I have, I ask the member for Johnston whether he subscribes to circumcision? That will be my last contribution in this adjournment. Does he support circumcision? That is the question. Does he or does he not?
Dr Burns: A different question.
Dr LIM: This issue is exactly the same. Does he or does he not support it? What about the other issue that I will not go into because I do not have the time? Does the member for Johnston support circumcision?
Mr AH KIT (Arnhem): Mr Deputy Speaker, I have a few things to adjourn on tonight. I will come back to the comments of the member for Greatorex in his adjournment in regards to his sniping, because that is what he does: he sits there and waits, surfs the net all day to find something he is too lazy to go and get his brain into gear and start thinking laterally.
I would like to pay tribute to an employee of the Department of Community Development, Sport and Cultural Affairs, Mrs Marie Strichen who, after 24 years, will retire from the Northern Territory Public Service. Marie has taken the option of early retirement, and will finish up this Friday. It has been a long marriage, and as her supervisor - Marie is jokingly known as his work wife in the department – said, he is not looking forward to the divorce this Friday.
Mrs Strichen will retire from her current position of Administration Manager in the Asset Services Division of Territory Housing, and from all reports, her willingness to share her knowledge with a happy disposition will be a hard act to follow. I believe Marie’s workmates refer to her as the ‘super user of asset information systems’ due to her extensive knowledge of the public housing construction arena.
From what I hear, Marie and her partner, Ben Munneke, have a keen interest in restoring vintage cars, and do a tremendous amount of volunteer work for Camp Quality during their annual rally through the centre of Australia. I hope that during retirement, they can continue to not only give so generously of their time, but also be able to enjoy life away from the workforce and take the trip in a campervan around Australia that they are planning.
I wish Marie and Ben all the very best, and congratulate, especially her, on her longevity of service. It is wonderful to see that in current times of employment transience, there are some people prepared to put in the hard yards in their service to the public over such a long time.
I would like to speak, not only as the Minister for Sport and Recreation, and the Patron of the Northern Territory Touch Association, but also as a friend of the Delacruz family. I am honoured to be here discussing the achievements of Bo Delacruz. As many members in this Chamber know, Bo worked in my office at reception for over 12 months, looking after incoming phone calls, filing, making appointments, doing the things a receptionist does, ensuring her work was always at the highest level.
Since 1996, Bo Delacruz has really been a superstar in terms of her development in touch. Bo has a very impressive record, not only in the Top End, but at state and national levels from 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999 and 2000, and she has achieved her gradual climb up the ladder to, in 1998, being selected in the International Australian Women’s Touch side.
Bo is an elite scholarship holder with the Northern Territory Institute of Sport. Bo celebrated 2002 by being recognised as the National NAIDOC Indigenous Sportsperson of the Year, beating Olympic gold medallist, Cathy Freeman, among others. Bo was part of the winning Australian team that beat the Kiwis in the trans-Tasman test series in Coffs Harbour during 2002.
Earlier this month, following successful selection in the Australian World Cup team, Bo travelled to Japan to contest the World Cup title. She was the only representative chosen from outside Queensland and New South Wales in the women’s team that played in Kumigaya, Japan. The Australian Women’s team, which won the last World Cup in Sydney four years ago, faced competition from Japan, New Zealand, Singapore and South Africa. The team has only ever lost one international game.
Bo said before she left that she had been part of the Australian team, but to be selected in the World Cup team was the ultimate. Bo undertook an intensive training program at the NTIS, under the careful eye of coach Peter Bell, in preparation for her trip in order to meet acceleration, speed, agility and anaerobic fitness requirements. It has just been revealed that the Australian Women’s team in Japan have successfully defended their World Cup title. More excitingly, Bo Delacruz has been named Player of the Series.
To Bo, one can only say your peers have voted you the best in the world. Bo, you have done the NT proud. You have stamped your special mark on touch football, both nationally and internationally. Your dedication, commitment, discipline and desire to achieve at the highest levels has borne rich fruit. The Delacruz family’s sporting prowess has never been questioned. You have continued the family tradition.
On behalf of my staff, your coach Peter Bell, Chris, the Northern Territory Touch Association, your very proud mum and dad, Norm and Joan, congratulations and well done.
Bo is will shortly be flying back to Sydney where she will take up her job with the Deadlies, based in Sydney. Bo was a winner of a Deadly Award in 2002. They awards presented to Aboriginal and Islander sports people who have excelled at the highest levels of their chosen sport. All I can say to Bo on behalf of the people for whom I speak, including members on this side of the House and, I would think, all members of this Chamber, and the people of the Northern Territory is: ‘Too Deadly!’
Members: Hear, hear!
Mr AH KIT: While I have a few minutes left, I would like to touch on how great the budget was. I understand that it is an opposition’s task to carry on about how negative the budget is.
However, the budget is a good budget for Territorians. The budget is fair in providing dollars around the Territory for things that people have been requesting for a number of years. It is so sad to sit here and listen to the negativity from the opposition about all the special programs that our government wants to introduce. When I hear that negativity, it sends a message to me that they are in opposition, and all they can do is complain because their job is to complain.
They have not taken into account all of the good messages that have come out through the media. The Treasurer stated quite clearly the other day - and I do not know what they cannot understand about the support for our government in respect of the budget. Mind you, we had a deficit that we have done well in clawing back. This is not a government that is going to announce projects and write blank cheques. This government is going to be mindful at all times of the responsibility it has in ensuring that taxpayers’ dollars are spent wisely. If there is planning that needs to be done properly, then we will ensure that we comply with it.
We have had some comments about indigenous affairs. We are moving forward; we are not sitting on our hands like the previous government. We want the opposition to work with us. I can tell them quite clearly right now: you can get up and have a shot at the interpreter service, we are moving that forward. The member for Sanderson explained tonight some of the complaints that the member for Macdonnell raised last night. However, we have a real problem. If you want to help us ensure that we get extra dollars into the Territory to start to arrest some of the indigenous concerns in remote areas of the Northern Territory, work with us. After all, they are your colleagues in Canberra; they are your mates who are controlling the purse strings. So do not sit there and whinge and whine and complain and not offer any assistance.
The Minister for Local Government, the Honourable Wilson Tuckey divided up $1.5bn. What has come to the Territory? Very little because they understand our needs, but they won’t put the dollars towards the needs; they go on some outdated formula, I can tell you from the housing side. The Aboriginal Rental Housing Program is missing out on something like $15-20m a year because the Honourable Senator Amanda Vanstone is using a formula from 1987. It doesn’t stop there. We have indigenous essential services missing out on dollars that the Commonwealth should be assisting us with.
In 1979, there were 71 communities that we were responsible for, and we signed up for that and we are delivering. But as we all supported the outstation movement, we had a situation where the Commonwealth did not continue to provide us with the extra dollars to deliver those essential services. We have seen communities in the situation where they have grown from outstations, so we have to deal with that. So if you want to be helpful and you really care about the Territory moving forward, and you want to assist us in attracting more dollars, give us a hand. I throw out the challenge to you: give us a hand; work with us to attract more dollars into the Territory for our needs.
Mr Deputy Speaker, the budget has been good. I will come back in the next couple of weeks and report on libraries and tail docking.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Mr Deputy Speaker, I will be relatively brief.
I want tonight to talk about a recent experience I had within my electorate of Araluen, one that in the medium to long term probably has some implications for the government.
I was invited by a man called Tim Jennings in Alice Springs to attend a store he has called the Mbantua General Store in Alice Springs. Tim Jennings has a number of businesses, essentially in Aboriginal art. I know Tim from a previous life. Another of his businesses is Mbantua General Store which, in essence, is a store designed for Aboriginal people in Gap Road in Alice Springs. It is a general store selling everything from kangaroo tails to runners to pots and pans. It really is like going into another world.
He operates the book-up system. Tim and I have talked about the book-up system for some time. To his credit, he invited me to work there for almost a full day to experience it. My experience is not in the area of Aboriginal affairs; that is not something that has been significant in my life in the Territory.
So in this job, perhaps more so than any other, you get to experience things that you would not ordinarily experience, and it is always a great pleasure. I give up my time to work in all sorts of organisations in my electorate, and I think it is especially important for me to work in Aboriginal organisations as well as non-Aboriginal organisations, and I have done some work with Aboriginal people.
Not surprisingly, I took up Tim’s offer to work in the Mbantua Store for a day. It was a real eye opener. I met the staff: Kevin, Sue, Faye and Kricia. I donned a pinnie and started to serve people. Business was surprisingly brisk. Lots of Aboriginal people, mainly women - I reckon about 90% of the people who came in were Aboriginal women - and they came not just from the few town camps nearby, but from other areas in Alice Springs. The reason they went to the Mbantua Store is that they could buy their groceries - Mbantua does not sell alcohol - at this store and utilise the book-up system.
I was really lucky because, in addition to serving people, I operated this thing called the book-up system. So I filled out the invoices and on other occasions took money from people and gave them change. What was most interesting, and this is part of the reason I rise tonight to talk about this, is that, of the customers who came in, as I said, about 90% of them were women, and many of those women brought children with them. They did not overflow with stories or information, but the staff obviously knew these women really well because they attended most days. I spoke to these women and, in a way, it was an eye opener, but in many respects not surprising. The reason these women went to this store every day was that most of them, although not all them, lived in nearby town camps.
We all know, in this House, that male violence against women in Aboriginal communities is endemic. The reason these women went there every morning to buy their groceries was that the violence the night before saw the men not only physically assaulting them, but really carving paths of destruction and taking their food, either eating it themselves or just destroying it, and that was a very clear message that came from these women.
On a more uplifting note, I talked to some of the old grandmothers. Many of them were there with their grandchildren. They took the responsibility to send their grandchildren to school. If we accept, as I am sure we all do, that education for all people in our society, but in particular in the Northern Territory, in light of the problems we have, for Aboriginal people, is so important, then we know that children can only go to school with a belly full of food, and they need to be looked after the night before. Clearly, they are not like white kids - in many cases, obviously, but I am essentially talking about the town camp situation. They do not have nice bedrooms with their names on the doors that say, for instance, this is Adam’s room, this is Zoe’s room, and these kids are not in bed by 7 o’clock in order to prepare for the next day at school. These kids are doing it very tough. It was great to see the grandmothers taking this responsibility and, really, I thought, taking a fair degree of pleasure in assuming this responsibility, and saying to a white woman like me: ‘Yes, I am sending my grandkids to school’, and I thought that was very important.
It is important not just to me as an individual, not just to me as a politician, but for all of us to see the good bits. In this place, we often talk about the bad bits, the problems that Aboriginal people face, and we are all committed to doing what we can for them. It is also fairly uplifting to see the positive aspects. For me, it was great to see senior Aboriginal women happily taking this responsibility for their grandchildren.
I know there are some people in the community who take the view that the book-up system is terrible and that it exploits people. No doubt that occurs in various places around the Territory. Exploitation occurs every day, in any state or any city or town in Australia. However, from my experience, and I know it was limited, of spending almost a full day at the Mbantua General Store in Gap Road in Alice Springs, I would have to say that the book-up system, to the extent that I know it, was fabulous because it afforded these women the opportunity to go the store and get their groceries when their men, the night before, assaulted them, ruined their food and, in days prior, took their money. So at least these women could take responsibility, or try to create their own destiny, I suppose, by going to the store and getting their groceries, so that they and their kids, and their grandkids could get a belly full of food. Now, to whitefellas like me, it is extraordinary that such simple things come into play.
I do come from what would be widely considered a privileged background. My life, in comparison, was significantly easier than some of these people. But in relation to the book-up system, I say that there are some real positives, and without the book-up system, these women and these families would not be able to cope.
I do not know what, if anything, the government has in mind as a long-term policy position in relation to the book-up system. I suspect that there are some broad concerns in relation to stores that provide book-up for alcohol, but at the same time, good people like Tim Jennings, who I think also has a store in Elliott, can provide great outcomes that are negotiated with Aboriginal people, and for Aboriginal people, and it all revolves around the book-up system and ensures that women and children, in particular, are fed.
Part of the reason I am raising this tonight is, in a very general sense, to flag to members of this Chamber that in the event that government is looking to longer term issues and policies in relation to what we know as the book-up system, I hope they do not have the narrow focus of seeing it as potentially exploitative because from my experience on that one day in Gap Road in Alice Springs, it was fantastic and it cannot be underrated.
In conclusion, it was a pleasure to attend the Mbantua General Store. It is a pleasure of this job because we have opportunities that in any other job we would not ordinarily have. In a month of Sundays, I would never have imagined that I would be invited to a place like Mbantua to serve people kangaroo tails, pots and pans and sandshoes. But it was a privilege, and one that I am truly glad I had. To other members of the Assembly who, perhaps, like me, do not know much about it, if you get the opportunity, grasp it with both hands because it is really very important that we, as representatives of the people, indigenous and non-indigenous, in the Northern Territory, understand all aspects of life for all people in the Northern Territory.
Ms SCRYMGOUR (Arafura): Mr Deputy Speaker, I would like to say, in terms of the member for Araluen’s adjournment, I really enjoyed listening to what she said. She said that working there for one day provided a small insight to what those women and children and grandmothers go through. There are good things and bad things about the book-up system, and that is something that has to be looked at.
There was something in the budget that likens to that, and it copped a lot of criticism in the budget, and that was the breakfast program. Some members opposite saw it as a means of welfare dependency. What they do not see is without it, how do they go to school? The member for Araluen touched on it before, do they go with empty bellies? Sometimes there needs to be that bit of assistance for those mothers and grandmothers. Most of the time, it is the grandmothers who are looking after those kids and getting them to school.
People like myself, the member for Barkly and a number of us who work with remote communities, see this destruction happening. A lot of it can go back to substance abuse, and that is certainly something that I, as a member of that committee, am quite keen to try to address some of the issues related to substance abuse. However, we still have to address the underlying issues of why people are drinking and spiralling into that destruction.
I just wanted to say that I really did enjoy the member for Araluen’s adjournment. I hope that it is not just going to be one day; it would be good to go back and continually do it because I believe everybody - it does not matter who they are or what walk of life they are from - needs to experience this sort of thing to gauge that understanding. I was glad to hear the member’s honesty and the little snapshot of what she went through.
Touching on my electorate, quickly, I have to mention the Tiwi Islands Grand Final. I know that the Clerk and other people habitually go over to the Tiwi Islands Grand Final. Certainly, the Chief Minister makes the journey to the Tiwi Islands every year. It is not until you actually go there that you get the full extent of all the hype and the celebrations. However, one of the stand-out things with this year’s Tiwi Islands Grand Final on 31 March was that, for the first time, it was a combined effort of all the arts and craft centres on the Tiwi Islands. This co-operation between the arts and crafts centres meant that all of the centres actually doubled, if not tripled, their sales in that one day. They really enjoy having the visitors coming over for the grand final, but it is also great to have those visitors appreciate the Tiwi art and purchasing that.
Still on the Tiwi Islands, I went over with Minister Henderson on 15 May to announce the Sylvatech project. It was certainly something. In particular, there was a poignant moment when we were talking about the forestry project and the vision of Tiwi and the late Jimmy Tipungwuti, the Chairperson of the Tiwi Land Council who died a few years ago. When members or elders from the land council and I had that meeting on 15 May and the announcement was made about the Northern Territory government’s contribution to the project, for us it was the coming alive, or seeing part of that vision that Jimmy Tipungwuti took on years ago and worked towards. There was a lot of criticism that the forestry was never going to eventuate into anything. It is a worthwhile project from our government’s perspective. I thank the minister because it was going around in circles. He picked it up and became the champion of the cause. It has real potential for economic development on Aboriginal land.
Centenary Medals: there were a few people from the Tiwi islands - my people – who received Centenary Medals. I congratulate Gibson Farmer, the President of Milikapiti Council; Walter Kerinauia, a senior traditional owner of Nguiu; Casimira Munkara, a health worker on Nguiu in the health centre for over 20 years; John Sebastian Pilakui; and my father, Barry Puruntatameri.
Mr Deputy Speaker, you would have known Barry for many years. I have mentioned Barry’s service to the community of Nguiu, his dedication and commitment to the community, on a couple of occasions in adjournment debates. Unfortunately, some of that commitment and wanting to make life better for the Tiwi youth who, like everywhere else, are in the grips of substance abuse, where we have probably have the highest rates of youth suicide in the Northern Territory in remote indigenous communities, is starting to take its toll on Dad. The struggle of every day trying to fight and deal with those issues in the community, the tiredness and his last stint in hospital has certainly had an impact. I wish him well and I cannot wait for the medals to be awarded and to watch his face and see him receive it.
Kilapawu, his wife, or Teresita, a teacher and the Principal of the Girls School on Nguiu, received a Medal as did Hyacinth Tungatalum, the first Tiwi person on the Legislative Council, if I recall, all those years ago. Anyway, that is the Tiwi Islands.
In terms of Warrawi, my favourite community, a small community of 300 people, a beautiful island coastal community. They have just finished a major IHMS housing maintenance program and all the houses have now been repaired and are up to a pretty good standard. They will be starting on their IHANT program that with three new houses and one major renovation.
In terms of Warrawi, Minjilang and Gunbalanya, and I know through local government, there is the Top End triangle happening between all of those communities which start from Pine Creek, working upwards and include Coomalie, Gunbalanya, Warrawi and Minjilang. The working together of those local government councils, although not amalgamated, but to see the support and relationship of all those councils is a good thing. In terms of Warrawi, which does not have the infrastructure or equipment to do their roads, there is support - and at the moment the Gunbalanya road team go over quite regularly to help, and they are working on their barge, and resurfacing the airstrip, so the Gunbalanya Council has certainly supported both Warrawi and Minjilang.
At Warrawi, the Mardbal Arts and Craft Centre has just been restored and they are looking for some funds. I am notice they are saying they want to talk to me about some money for arts and crafts. I had a look when they started developing that Arts and Crafts Centre, and again, economic development opportunities, to see the art come from that community - I often wear the beads, and I wore a string yesterday, and a lot of the beads that I do wear actually come from the women at Warrawi. Their art, not just the beads, but the paintings, bags and all the other stuff they are doing out there is quite beautiful.
Bev McLeod is the Nurse Manager who has just gone back to the Warrawi Health Clinic. When I was working in Katherine West, I recruited Bev McLeod, a very experienced remote area nurse. She came from Warrawi and took up clinic management in one of the clinics in Katherine West, and Jim Gorey, the Community Manager out at Warrawi, tells me you can not keep good people away from the place. Bev has now moved from Katherine West and gone back to Warrawi, so I am certainly looking forward to catching up with her when I get back out there. Warrawi has been fortunate, and with Bev going back, they have some money from Networking the Nation and, with the support of Territory Health Services, will look at introducing the PCIS or the Primary Care Information System for the first time. So good things are happening there.
Maningrida - I had better hurry up - and I will quickly read this because we talk about the Tiwi Grand Final, we also have to look at Maningrida where there are about eight teams. They have just as many teams as the Tiwi Islands, although we have to try lift the profile of Maningrida. In somewhat controversial circumstances, St Kilda - that is one of the teams out there - took out the 2003 Maningrida Football Grand Final, defeating the Tigers by just five points. It was a very even and close match all the way, though, with the teams often being within a few points of each other. On the final siren, the Tigers led by one point and the supporters ran onto the oval, believing they had won the match. However, the umpire’s whistle was not to finish the game but to indicate a penalty kick to the St Kilda player who then kicked a goal. This, of course, meant that St Kilda finished five points ahead. You can imagine in somewhat controversial circumstances how that game ended up.
In his closing address, Council Chairman Maurice said that although it was a very unusual finish, it was nevertheless quite legal, and he thanked the umpires, who were all from the NTFL and had been flown in especially for the day. I promise …
Dr Burns: [inaudible] to the airport.
Ms SCRYMGOUR: Yes, get them out to the airport really fast. I told Maurice I would read that into Hansard because it was a great day. They have invited the NTFL umpires to go back for another go again next year. We might get you, Mr Deputy Speaker, out there. Maningrida has also, besides football, sent in some touch football players and they did quite well.
I join the Minister for Sport in extending congratulations to Bo Delacruz who is truly an inspiration for all our young indigenous girls and women. Her credentials are outstanding. We are proud of her, and certainly I join the list of many admirers and people who praise, the praise thoroughly well deserved. I say to Bo - and this is something my daughters say - ‘Go, girl, you are a legend’.
Mr KIELY (Sanderson): Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise to speak about a wonderful event which occurred in my electorate office not so long ago, the Cancer Council of the Northern Territory’s Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea that was sponsored out of the Sanderson office.
We hosted a morning tea for the Cancer Council NT on 14 May. It was a fun day for everyone who attended. We had our great cuppa a week before the main event. There were so many happening that we thought we would jump the gun. We have had them there a number of times and it is always a great morning.
I entertained my guests that morning with my cooking of scrumptious scones and pancakes. I actually got up at 6 o’clock and cooked up a mob of scones, some with dates. The funny story about cooking up the dates is that my young fellow got up because he smelt the first batch cooking. There I was busily chopping up the dates, and he said: ‘What are they, Dad?’, because he has never seen dates. I said: ‘They are cockroaches’. He said: ‘Cockroaches?’. I said: ‘Yes, first you boil them, then you take the legs off, then you chop them all up and put them in the scones. Would you like some?’. He said: ‘Oh, no!’. I said: ‘They are beautiful’, and I picked up a piece and ate it. Lucky he didn’t have his cornflakes, let me tell you. Then I said: ‘No, I am only fooling, Ned’. We got on with the cooking, and the kids actually had a feed of scones before they went to school. They thought that was pretty special.
The story about the pancakes is that I set up the barbecue in the electorate office to cook up pancakes as well. My community room became a barbecue cooking area and guests entering the shopping centre could smell fresh baking. Northlakes does not have a Brumby’s; it was Len Kiely’s bakery hard at it. The visitors to the morning tea had their choice of fresh baked scones or hot pancakes that came straight off the barbie.
We also conducted raffles and lucky door prizes, which were donated by local businesses. A beaut prize was donated by Henry Yap of Yap and Associates. They have Luma Luma Apartments, and they donated one night’s accommodation. John Lay Enterprises donated a set of mugs. These businesses happily gave to this cause. They understand what it is. We were very grateful for their support, and we were able to then raffle these prizes off to the people who attended. The luck door prize, a lovely set of mugs, was donated by the Cancer Council. These mugs are in great demand.
A special thanks goes to Barbara Bagley, Teng Murray and Dawn Lawrence, who jointly coordinated, together with my Electorate Officer, Therla Fowlestone, in helping to make this event successful. I cannot give enough thanks to Therla and the work she does in that office, both in a community sense and the work she does organising me. She is a valuable asset not only to me, but very much to the electorate of Sanderson. She keeps that place ticking over like a charm. I wish every elected member had a person like her, and I wish every electorate had an electorate officer who has the heart that she has and the commitment that she has to the electorate.
I also thank the shop holders in Northlakes Shopping Centre for their donations. They were great, given that a lot of them were at work and could not make it into the morning tea, but nevertheless they donated. The generosity of those who attended allowed us to raise a total of $303 for the Cancer Council of the NT for cancer research, an excellent effort.
My thanks also goes to the people who attended the morning tea, and for their generous donations in support of this annual event. Serafina Fernandes lives just down the road from the office. She regularly pops in is always a joy to see. She brought along her friend, Maria de Silva. Maria lives near Northlakes. I ran into Mrs de Silva when I was door knocking for the Salvos a few weeks ago. She is a senior Territorian, and she donated to the Salvos, and that was very kind of her. Tony Brangan, my next door neighbour at Northlakes Shopping Centre and the manager of the Northlakes Family Chemist popped in. Tanuli Tinai-Chan, a member of the Samoan community, and her friend Emma Sullivan, who is the President of the Asia Pacific Group. Tanuli introduced me to police who were members of the UN peace keeping force in Timor, and that is how I became involved with the Samoan community. I am really looking to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association’s conference in Samoa for two days, and back to Alice Springs for six. In Samoa, I will be looking up these police officers. I already have an appointment with the police commissioner to discuss the work they do, how they are valued in Timor, and how they are valued by our community here. I look forward to catching up with many of the policemen whom I have met previously.
Thanks to Judy Herring, the Johnston electorate officer, who gave us a bit of a hand and lent her support for the day; much appreciated, Mrs Herring. Terry Newman, the coach of the Pints Junior Cricket Club, popped in. We have a close affinity with the Pints Junior Cricket Club. I like the work that Terry does with them, and junior cricket in the Territory is going a long way, thanks to Terry and his associates. Liz Gammon, the Principal of Anula School, popped in. It was great to see her. Judy Williamson, the owner-operator of the newsagency across the road, popped in and she is always a delight. Stephanie Lin from the Hot Wok Noodle Caf. We approach Stephanie if we are having a function and get her to cater for it. She is a hard worker. She is Timorese-Chinese, has heart of gold and it is wonderful to have made her acquaintance. Tony Miaoudis, the centre manager, came in. Kathie Snowball, the Executive Officer of the Darwin Toy Library, dropped in and she won a door prize. Kathie is another person with great community spirit.
So, too, are Julie Schuller and her daughter, Fleur, who are with the Cat Society of the NT. Last year at the show, I presented the prize for best cat. There is a funny story there because they were judging the cats and I remember that they had one out and they were looking at it, and the cat actually locked onto this person’s head. It looked more like a cat hat than a cat, and they had to get it off. But, it won. It was a beautiful cat. You go to the show, and they have these signs up about cats being temperamental. It is quite interesting when you get in there.
I will have the pleasure this year to be working at the Glenti, which is on the Saturday and the Sunday. I will be working on the Sunday. I have to slip out of my Greek costume, wash off the yiros, go back down to the cat show for a presentation, and then back to the Glenti. I tell you, that Sunday is going to be a treat for me. I am really happy to be asked to make a presentation.
A friend, Mark Wheeler, popped in. Kathy Cercarelli and Liz Clark from the Legislative Assembly brought over my new vehicle. Weren’t they lucky? Fortunately, they dropped in and here it all was, it was all happening. Kathy is on a bit of a diet and she stuck to it. Not Liz. Liz had a good feed and a good chat. They bought raffle tickets and they kicked in to the donation box and that was wonderful of them.
Eric Hurwood, whom I met when I was campaigning had just moved back into the neighbourhood. Eric is a retired fireman from the airport, and he does work for Lions. He is a great lad who is very community minded. Julie Tammo and Brian Price. I have had a lot to do with Brian over the last couple of years, particularly with the Skal Club. He is a very knowledgeable person in the hospitality area. He would be an asset to any company. His knowledge is incredible and flows freely. He is a very cluey man. Barbara Carell and Trish Shebella from Australia Post. Of course, with the mail-out that we have done recently, we have been working with Australia Post, and Trish has been coming down and explaining to us and getting us the best deal for our mail-outs. She is a credit to Australia Post. She is very professional, provides great customer service and I think Australia Post should give her a bit of a bonus for the work she does, especially tolerating people like me. She is wonderful.
I am glad that I have the opportunity to place on the record the success of the Big Cuppa, and to thank the people who attended and made it a success. Without them and this community spirit, the NT Cancer Council would be a lot poorer, but the community would be the poorest of the poor. So I thank them for their spirit.
I look forward to the event again next year and the aim will be to raise more funds for cancer research. Who knows? I might even cook a barbecue chicken next time.
Dr BURNS (Johnston): Mr Deputy Speaker, last Sunday, when I was collecting for the Salvation Army Red Shield Appeal, I happened to knock on Luke Morcom’s door. Luke is a very generous person, but the long and the short of it is Luke has asked me to speak about Jakamara Tony Reardan (Riordan) who, like Luke, is part of the Stolen Generation. He passed away in Brisbane on 7 May this year. I would like to read some extracts of a eulogy for Tony. This story is about the Stolen Generation, but it is also about Luke Morcom and his spirit. It will become evident.
Jakamara was born at Wave Hill Station on 7 March 1951, and came from a family of nine. He had six brothers and two sisters. His sisters and brothers have all passed away, and their children were at the funeral to pay their respects. He was part of the Northern Territory Stolen Generations, and was taken from his mother at the age of three to Garden Point Catholic Mission on Melville Island in 1954. There were other children from Yuendumu, Lajamanu and Wave Hill Station. Many other children from Top End communities were there too, and some from Borroloola in the Gulf of Carpentaria.
In September 1963, he and two other boys from Borroloola, Luke Morcom and Ken Hale, left Garden Point Catholic Mission to be fostered out in Adelaide, South Australia. There began a very close friendship. Luke and Jakamara were like brothers. They ended up fostered into the same family in Adelaide, and they used to play football together in the Elizabeth Eagles and won the 1965 under 14 grand final. Both attended St Mary Magdelene’s Primary School in Elizabeth, and then went on to Elizabeth Boys’ Technical High School. Luke says that Jakamara gave him some pretty good advice. He told him not to get into trouble with the law and to respect the police, and Luke agrees that this was the best advice that anyone had ever given him, and made a promise to Jakamara that he would always remember his advice.
Mr Deputy Speaker, Luke has taught his sons the same way. The long and the short of it is that Jakamara and Luke went their separate ways in life, and it was not until someone rang Luke recently trying to search out the identity of this man who was known to come from the Northern Territory, who was dying in a nursing home at Eagleby in Brisbane. Eventually, it occurred to Luke who this person was, that it was his long lost step-brother - he had not seen him for over 30 years - and he was reunited with Jakamara on his death bed.
In a way, fate intervened. You really have to look at the bright and optimistic side of life, and that is what Luke does. I have spoken about Luke Morcom’s poetry before. Mr Deputy Speaker, I seek leave to have this poem incorporated into the Parliamentary Record. I do not think I can read it.
Leave granted.
Identification
- The old man lay dying in his hospital bed
It’s been nine years, some days almost dead.
He talks of his youth when a football star
Of wine, women and brawls in many city bars.
No one knows his identity, family,
where he comes from.
Is he Tiwi, Yanyuwa, Warlpiri he must have some
Some days are golden, others not so very good
Elder in Jimbelunga Centre, respected
in neighbourhood.
For two long months trying to track family down
Maybe he from Adelaide or some
Northern Territory town
Got to spread the word, find family
for this lonely man
Use all our resources, e-mail all out countryman.
Send the message out quickly, local and interstate
He is drifting in and out of consciousness
in a bad state
There must be someone who knows just who he is
A prayer sent to heaven begging God help up please.
Somewhere far away up in the Top End
A man checks his e-mail as a new day begins.
A niece in Cairns tells us about the
poor man’s plight
Do you know him, Uncle, I thought a
slim chance you might?
They say that he is Tiwi but no one knows this man
I want you to help him Uncle, I’ve
asked my countryman
They think he came from Adelaide
or so my friend says
Use your contacts, Uncle, you have
plenty of friends today.
There is great silence, he recognises the name
It’s been thirty-one years, just who is to blame
He picks up the phone, thoughts congest his head
He heard long ago that this man was dead.
He breaks down and cries and takes in deep breaths
And listens to what is said, a brother close to death
Thirty-one years ago, has it really been that long?
Two different pathways, one right, the other wrong.
He tells the story about when they were young
Taken from their mothers when their
lives had just begun
Both are members of Australia’s Stolen Generations
Finally, at last Tony has clear identification!
Dr BURNS: Mr Deputy Speaker, tonight I would also like to speak about the Sri Lankan New Year celebrations that I, along with others, attended on 26 April at the MGM Grand ballroom. The occasion was to celebrate the Sinhalese and Tamil new year which occurred on 13 and 14 April 2003.
The celebration has a family focus, much like Christmas. They farewell the old year, a period of doing nothing and catching up and giving gifts and wearing new clothes, preparing food, wishing family and friends well for the new year and generally having a good family time.
The function was organised by the Sri Lankan Australian Friendship Association, and the hosts were Mr Ranjith Ramachandra, President of the association, and his wife, Swarna. There were about 240 invitees and guests; it was packed out, that night. Among those who attended were the members for Fannie Bay, Casuarina, Wanguri and Sanderson. Thanks to the assistance to the Northern Territory Office of Ethnic Affairs, the organisers were able to bring a leading, internationally renowned dance troupe from Sri Lanka, directed by Mrs Rajini Selavnayagam. Rajini’s dancing troupe has been positively received both in the east and west. They have performed in Pakistan, India, Japan, Russia, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. They had a mixture of dancing, from the low lands, the hill country, and Kaffringa dances which are associated with the Portuguese occupation of the island 500 years ago. The dancing was beautiful - these are people who have dedicated their lives to dance, they have obviously studied it and are very accomplished in what they do. Some of the dances were very elegant and graceful, and some of it was very boisterous and athletic. It was very entertaining, particularly the one with the candles waving around the head. It was very enjoyable.
During the proceedings, the Chief Minister made an announcement about funding for the Buddhist Centre, and that has come to light in the last few weeks - I was glad to attend that function, too. There was beautiful food, a sumptuous Sri Lankan dinner, which was absolutely delicious. I congratulate the Sri Lankan community in Darwin, especially those - I know there are many people, and we meet them everywhere - in the electorate of Johnston: Don and Sirima Thilakaratne, Peter and Karuna Fernando, Walter and Claudette Perera, Selva and Lalitha Selvaratnam, Shan and McDonna Selvaratnam, Bertie and Ramola Sebastion-Pillai. My thanks and best wishes go to the Sri Lankan community for the wonderful evening, and I hope they will continue to contribute to the multicultural life of the Northern Territory.
The primary schools in my electorate do a great job, and I am very proud of them, and Casuarina Senior College of course. I would like to speak about Moil Primary School. They recently ran a limerick competition, with the first prize being a V8 Supercar hot pass. The limerick had to have a Northern Territory theme, and they received some excellent entries. Kyan Standish from year 6C won the competition, and his limerick was chosen by the principal and students during Assembly. Kyan’s limerick was:
- There one was a wallaby
Who had an ambition to ski
So he went to the snow
But he froze his big toe
And cried ‘I prefer the NT!’
That is a great limerick, and congratulations to Kyan. Also from Moil Primary, I heard that Bryony Crowe from 4-7K was selected in the squad for the NT Netball Exchange to be held in Palmerston from 16 to 18 June, so congratulations. Sixty-two girls from the City Cluster schools tried out for 18 places, so this is a great achievement on Bryony’s part.
Casuarina Senior College has its fair share of sports too, with Allen Chau being selected to compete with the School Sport NT Tennis Championship team in Perth this month. Shane Chandler, Christine Cooper, Kassandra Haigh and Patina Grass were selected for the NT Basketball Team. They will be competing in the School Sport Australia Event in Darwin during August, and I wish them all the best.
Casuarina College is in the midst of preparing for its 30th birthday celebrations, which will be held in August. This will be a great event for us all. There will be many people, both students and staff from the school over the past 30 years. It will be a great time, with a number of events and a bit of history being rolled out, so I commend that event to everybody.
Last year, I offered to sponsor, in conjunction with the Rotary Club of Darwin Sunrise and St John Ambulance, a competition for Year 6 and 7 students to write a 150-200 word essay on the importance of a St John Ambulance Officer in the community, and I know this a topic close to your heart, Mr Deputy Speaker. The competition attracted 80 entries, all of which were excellent. However, there was only one winner, and it gave me great pleasure to present a cheque for $200 to Maree Grogan from St Francis of Assisi School in Humpty Doo. Obviously, the focus was on St John Ambulance and the fantastic work they do: the volunteers; the professionalism; the stress that is part and parcel of their job. I am a great admirer of St John, and it is appropriate that have recognition from the community that they so richly deserve.
I also spoke about Darwin Rotary Sunrise, a group I have had a bit to do with over the years. They are fantastic. I have been spoken at a few of their meetings. They are a very go-ahead group, with good ideas, good personnel, and I am pleased to be associated with them.
Together with colleagues on this side of the House, I had great pleasure in presenting a cheque to the World’s Greatest Shave for a Cure on 14 March to the Leukaemia Foundation during radio station 104.9’s quest to collect enough money to have Lisa’s head shaved. She was brave enough to go through with it. The Leukaemia Foundation is a great charity.
That is all I have tonight. I will return to where I started and add the courage and resilience, love and gentle qualities of someone like Luke Morcom, who has been through so much in his life, never ceases to amaze me. I am full of admiration for Luke. There is no hint of bitterness in the man, and there could be. As a human being, he is a shining light for me. I consider myself fortunate to have visited his home when he told me the story of this reunion that seemed fated in the stars, in a way. I was pleased to present that tonight.
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you, member for Johnston. Before I wind up, I should remind you that Australia’s Biggest Morning Breakfast will be at Howard Springs Shopping Centre this Saturday between 8am and 12 noon. Toast, crumpets, croissants, tea, coffee and milo will be served. You are all welcome.
Motion agreed to; the Assembly adjourned.
Last updated: 04 Aug 2016