2001-10-23
Madam Speaker Braham took the Chair at 10 am.
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, all Territorians will have the opportunity to contribute to my government’s November Economic Development Summit through community forums, an interactive website, and written and oral submissions. As honourable members would know, the summit will be held from Sunday, 4 to Tuesday, 6 November at Parliament House.
To ensure that all Territorians have an opportunity to have their say about the Territory’s future, the summit will be preceded by community forums in Darwin, Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, Katherine and Nhulunbuy this Sunday, 28 October. Ideas canvassed at the forum will then be presented at the summit. The summit will be co-chaired by Territory businessman, Neville Walker and former Territory senator, Bob Collins. I have invited more than 100 participants from industry, business and community groups, including representatives from local government, indigenous and ethnic groups, rural and regional organisations, and unions.
The summit will be structured to generate key recommendations for the November mini-budget and my government’s long term economic development strategy. It will also play a pivotal role in shaping programs for the Business Round Table and the Office of Territory Development.
Madam Speaker, I am determined to restore Territory business and community confidence. The world, Australia and the Territory are facing economic and social challenges. I believe that all Territorians have a role to play in our future prosperity, that is why we are establishing an inclusive process for the summit. The Department of Industries and Business will coordinate the community forums with Regional Economic Development Committee, business, industry and community representation. We will ensure that the issues raised at those forums feed directly into the summit proceedings. In the same way, website, written and oral submissions will also be collated and considered.
Guest speakers at the summit include the Director of the National Institute for Economic and Industry Research, Dr Peter Brain; Futures Specialist, Dr Peter Ellyard; the Chairman of the New South Wales Premier’s Council on the Cost and Quality of Government, Economist Professor Percy Allan; the Chairman of Indigenous Business Australia, Joseph Elu; and former Territorian and now Research Fellow at the Institute for Rural Futures, Dr Judith McNeill. Background papers and forum outcomes will be posted on the website prior to the summit.
I expect a wide range of submissions from summit participants, which will identify options for the Territory’s future. The summit website, which is now operational, is www.econsummit.nt.gov.au. The 1800 number for people to contact for further details on the summit or to submit their ideas is 1800 000 971.
My colleague, the Minister for Industries and Business, Paul Henderson, is chair of the organising committee for the summit and I encourage all members to get involved and talk to us about this very important event for the Territory.
Mr AH KIT (Transport and Infrastructure Development): Madam Speaker, this morning I had the honour to launch a trial of the transport of Territory mangoes to the large market of Hong Kong. This was done in conjunction with my colleague, the Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries. This trial is in fact a cooperative effort between the mango industry, the Territory government, Western Australia and the Commonwealth. I applaud this cooperative effort between the industry and government in seizing opportunities to develop new and expanded markets for Territory produce.
The successful export of mangoes by sea freight would provide a great boost to the industry. It would open up access to very large markets and in large volumes. The sorts of volumes that can be secured using sea freight are substantially more than can be serviced by air freight. The mango sea freight trial builds on the innovations of Territorians to become key players in the supply, service and distribution chains in our region. The Logistics Branch of the Department of Transport and Works is providing local produce exporters with hands-on assistance to open new markets and test distribution channels and handling capabilities. The Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries is also providing expert advice to exporters on the life cycles of specific products, the best times to harvest and how best to transport the goods. This joint assistance includes working with freighters to determine optimal transport methods at every point prior to and along the chain. In recent months, assistance has been provided in monitoring trials of live mud crab exports by air to new markets in Taiwan and the United States. Export of cut flowers by air freight to Brunei has also been evaluated.
Today saw the commencement of a carefully monitored trial shipment of two freight containers packed with 18 pallets of Territory mangoes. The mangoes will be shipped to Hong Kong using modified atmosphere technology. The oxygen content of the controlled atmosphere is reduced by injection of nitrogen. Modified atmosphere technology is a key element in this trial. It controls the ripening process extending the shelf life and therefore the competitiveness of the mangoes when delivered to the destination market. The containers will be transhipped through Singapore and total shipping time to Hong Kong is expected to be between 12 and 15 days. This is a fairly standard distribution process for Asian sea freight. The requirement to tranship through Singapore emphasises the importance of the modified atmosphere technology in marketing perishable product such as mangoes.
Representatives from the Northern Territory mango industry and the Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries will be on hand to evaluate the product when it arrives in Hong Kong.
This trial is the result of months of collaboration between mango growers, packaging suppliers, marketing agents, shipping lines, the technology providers and the three governments involved in this trial. In the lead-up to the trial, growers have implemented a strict disease management regime; packing manufacturers have developed appropriate packaging; and overseas customers have been actively consulted and involved. The trial is jointly funded by the Department of Transport and Works, the Western Australian Sea Freight Council and the Commonwealth Department of Transport and Regional Services.
I take this opportunity to congratulate all involved in the project. I know that the trial to date has provided a good opportunity for building communication and cooperative efforts across industries and government. Beyond this trial, I trust that the continuing development of these relationships will result in great developments for the Territory.
Mrs AAGAARD (Health, Family and Children’s Services): Madam Speaker, I rise to report to the Assembly on something that I am sure we all wish was not necessary, and that is our experience of and response to the threat of bioterrorism. While my colleague, the Minister for Police, Fire and Emergency Services has lead responsibilities on this issue, Territory Health Services has a major role to play.
In response to events in the USA, Territory Health Services personnel have been engaged in a number of national and local activities. A Chemical, Biological and Radiation Disaster Management Committee has been formed comprising Northern Territory Hospital administrators, microbiologists, infectious disease physicians, emergency medicine physicians and disease control staff, to review protocols and procedures.
A meeting was held on 12 October specifically around suspect materials presented to Northern Territory police. On 15 October, the Chief Executive Officer, Chief Health Officer and an expert microbiologist met with the Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner of Police to review procedures for handling any suspicious items. The police subsequently issued a media release providing advice to the public on handling any items of concern. You may have seen advertisements in the weekend papers advising the public about cautionary measures in opening mail. A 1800 number has now been established for any queries and to provide advice. This number is 1800 555 740.
So far, three letters and a package at Darwin Airport have raised concern, and were handled according to procedure. On inspection they were found not to be a threat. I can assure members and the public that there is ongoing communication between Territory Health Services and Police and Emergency Services to ensure a well-coordinated and informed response.
At a national level, Australia has had precautionary measures in place for a number of years, and the health system’s level of preparedness was greatly increased as part of the lead-up to the 2000 Olympics. Territory Health Services’ disease control staff have participated in daily teleconferences with the Communicable Disease Network Australia, the Public Health Laboratory Network and the Acting Commonwealth Chief Health Officer, Professor John Mathews, to share information on any events or emerging issues, and to discuss approaches.
Priority has been given to ensuring that accurate and consistent information is provided to the public, including general disease information and handling of mail and packages, as well as information for health care practitioners and microbiologists. Information collated at these meetings is being distributed to all Northern Territory general medical practitioners, physicians and district disease control officers, and to these groups nationally. There have also been national teleconferences of chief health officers with Professor John Mathews to ensure comprehensive communication and information-sharing. Senior microbiologists have been involved in similar activities to coordinate laboratory procedures for suspect materials and their handling by laboratory personnel.
Territory residents should not feel unduly concerned. Advice from the Commonwealth’s Department of Health and Aged Care is that Australia is well-prepared for the very unlikely event of biological incident, and there is no reason to be alarmed by reports from America of cases of anthrax. National emergency action plans are in place for the protection of the population. I encourage people to be alert, but be assured that Territory agencies are now well-informed and prepared to respond if required.
Dr TOYNE (Primary Industry and Fisheries): Madam Speaker, yesterday I met with a delegation from East Sumba, led by the Regent of East Sumba, Mr Umbu Mehang Kunda, to mark the purchase from the Territory of a consignment of breeder cattle by East Sumba.
Sumba is a relatively large island in eastern Indonesia, halfway between Kupang and Bali, and exports Ongole cattle, which are very similar to our Brahmans, to the Jakarta market. An initiative between the NT government and the Indonesian Minister for Trade and Industry previously resulted in a program of training conducted by my Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries in the autonomous regencies of Sumba. Sumba has two regencies, East and West, similar to our shires. The emphasis was on breeder herd management, as the region is one of the major cattle-producing areas in Indonesia, and likely customers for Northern Territory breeding cattle. Attendees of training courses also came from other islands in eastern Indonesia.
Representatives from East Sumba came to the Northern Territory in July to inspect cattle and select animals for purchase. The 600 breeding cows selected are due to be shipped to East Sumba at the end of the month and are presently going through standard quarantine preparation. Accompanying the cows will be two bulls donated by the Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries. While in the Northern Territory, the delegation will meet with the Mayor of Katherine to develop an information and cooperation agreement. They will also be inspecting the cattle being prepared for shipment at Carbeen Park, the depot facility of exporter, Wallco International.
A delegation from West Sumba is expected in the near future. They will be selecting similar breeding cows for shipment to the western regency. They are also keen to purchase local racehorses to add to their field of Sumba gallopers. The Martin government also looks forward to a positive and developing relationship with the governments of East and West Sumba. Our meeting yesterday has furthered that aim.
Reports noted pursuant to Sessional Order.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business)(by leave): Madam Speaker, I move the motion appearing on the Notice Paper, in a slightly amended form. The motion that is on the Notice Paper refers to: ‘That at the end of Standing Order 21A, add …’. Standing Order 21A refers to one committee only, and the intention for this amendment is for the change to apply to all committees, not just one.
The motion itself is designed to offer continuity to the lives of our parliamentary committee …
Madam SPEAKER: Could you read the amended motion to us now.
Mr STIRLING: I now move:
The purpose of the motion is to offer continuity to the life and work of our parliamentary committees which, we all know, end when the session of parliament ends at the end of the electoral cycle, and then they are re-formed under the new parliament. My advice is that only one of our parliamentary committees has this power and that is the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee, which can go back and revisit decisions, minutes, transcripts and all of the information records held in the name of that committee or a similar committee.
It would seem to me to be a right that should exist for all committees, to access the earlier work done on behalf of committees. An example would be that we now have a Substance Abuse Committee in this parliament. Previously, there was a Use and Abuse of Alcohol Committee. It seems to me that it would make sense to empower this new committee to be able to access the records, the transcripts, the interviews, the discussions that took place in Aboriginal communities - including those as far back as when that committee was formed - so that the committee had a view, in an historic context, of what those communities were saying, the views they were putting forward in relation to problems such as alcohol abuse, compared to where they may be sitting now. So, it is an ability to inform the committee of valuable work that has gone on in the past, other than the end-life of the committee, which usually was in the form of a report to this Assembly.
I urge members to support the motion. It is simply put forward as an enabling mechanism to enable members of committees in this parliament today to access that valuable earlier work on those occasions when they might need to. It simply avoids reinventing the wheel but it is more than that; it is enabling committee members to get that very valuable and, I think important in some cases, historical context as to how we may have gotten to the situation where we are today.
Madam Speaker, I urge members to support the motion.
Mr BURKE (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, in terms of the Deputy Chief Minister’s comments with regards to the rationale for moving this amendment, the opposition has no problems with it. It seems to me to be a commonsense approach considering the example he uses. I would raise the observation, though, that in terms of that particular example whilst a new committee has been formed, it would seem to me to be a simple part of the terms of reference of that committee to include the avenue for that committee to look back on previous reports if it so wishes as part of those terms of reference.
But in a general sense, it seems to me that, for example, in other committees, the Public Accounts Committee can inquire and report to the Assembly on any question referred to it by this Assembly. So as the government has the numbers, it is quite within the power of the government to refer any question to any committee by resolution of this Assembly.
What I would strike a note of caution about is I would hope that these committees do not spend too much of their time looking backwards. The intent of, I would hope, us all is to look forward in these issues. There are weighty issues that involve Territorians across a whole range of concerns. Certainly I would hope to see these committees looking forward in terms of the initiatives and recommendations that they bring forward rather than dwelling on some of the more contentious issues that we are all aware of that have raised their head from time to time in the past. If the committees got themselves bogged down in an exercise in hindsight rather than exercise in forward looking, it would be disappointing from the opposition’s point of view.
With those few comments, Madam Speaker, we support the intent of the motion.
Motion agreed to.
Ms MARTIN (Treasurer): Madam Speaker, I table the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report 2000-01.
In accordance with section 9 of the Financial Management Act I am pleased to table, as Treasurer, my first Treasurer’s Annual Financial Statement for the 2000-01 financial year. The statement forms part of the 2000-01 Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report.
As part of my commitment for clear and unambiguous reporting of the financial outcomes of the Territory government, I have made a number of improvements to the format of the report. The overview has been expanded to include more analysis of the actual outcome compared with the 2000-01 published budget identifying key events during the year which contributed to significant variations. An analysis of the gross and net debt stocks over the time is also provided with greater emphasis on general government debt and the Territory’s other major liabilities being employee entitlements.
This foreshadows the move to shift government trading enterprises such as the Power and Water Authority out of the budget scope. The schedules within Part 1 have been reordered to show the budget sector outcome for 2000-01 using the economic transactions or ‘net’ presentations as the lead schedule. This summary table removes many of the transactions between government entities and hence provides a better basis for assessing the effect of the Territory’s budget on the economy. This is now followed by the gross outlays and the receipts of the public account and for individual agencies.
Published budget figures for comparison with the actual results have also been included in Part 1 for the first time. Schedule 1.8 shows approved variations made to the budget during the year for each agency by activity. This is now followed by a new schedule providing detailed explanation of significant variations between the published budget and the actual results for each agency.
Following recommendations from the recent Allan Report, data in respect of the Territory’s material liabilities, being net debt and employee entitlements, has been brought together and included in Part 10. Greater emphasis has also been given to general government sector debt levels. While these changes do not fully address my commitment for the report to be an informative document satisfying the needs of the lay person and members of the parliament, as well as the technocrats, they represent some marked improvements given the relatively short timeframe in which they have been implemented.
Schedules 1.1 to 1.3 show the budget sector outcome for 2000-01 using the economic transactions or net presentation. Schedule 1.1 shows a reduction in net debt or surplus of $41m for the 2000-01 financial year. However, I would like to draw your attention to two transactions which in effect overstate the reported result by $181m. The underlying result is, in fact, an increase in net debt or deficit of $140m.
The first transaction relates to the Conditions of Service Trust. As honourable members are undoubtedly aware, in the lead up to the 2001-02 budget the then government decided that the Conditions of Service Trust that had been held outside the public account would be wound up and the residual amount transferred to the public account in the form of a receipt. At the time of the transfer, the value of the Conditions of Service Trust investments was $157m. This transfer therefore had the impact of improving the budget outcome by $157m. This transfer does not represent an actual increase in the net worth of the Territory government; it is simply a transfer from one bucket to another bucket. This transfer has been strongly criticised by the Auditor-General in his report tabled in this House last week.
The other major transaction relates to an advance of $25m to the AustralAsia Railway Corporation. Due to conditions associated with the loan, the carrying value of this advance at 30 June 2001 has been assessed at $0.4m. This is a worse case scenario, but a reasonable reflection of the value at this point in time. This reduction in value also contributes to a further deterioration in the reported result for 2000-01 of $24.6m.
After adjusting for these two transactions, the published result of a decrease in net debt of $41m changes to an underlying increase in net debt of $140m. Comparing this underlying result to the 2000-01 published budget shows an increase in net debt of $95m. The deterioration in the budget result throughout the year was due to an increase in expenditure not matched by comparable revenue increases or savings. Recurrent expenditure in the year was $1876m, $74m higher than budgeted. The majority of the increase was due to increased operating costs with health and education alone contributing to almost half of the increase. Capital expenditure also increased, largely associated with the settlement and association acquisition of - guess what? - the Darwin to Katherine transmission line. Gross debt at 30 June 2001 using the Public Accounts scope was $2231m – you will find that detail in Schedule 4.1. This is $180m higher than in 1999-2000 and $246m higher than at 30 June 1999. This reflects the previous government’s need over the last two years to fund substantial budget deficits through increased borrowings.
The gross debt reported in Part 9 of $2242m is compiled on the Uniform Presentation scope, a broader scope from the Public Accounts scope. It includes entities external to the public account or off budget such as the AustralAsia Railway Corporation, PAWA subsidiaries Darnor and Gasgo, and the Northern Territory Legal Aid Commission. The gross debt is $178m higher than June 2000 and $243m higher than at June 1999, consistent with the changes in public account debt levels.
At the 30 June 2001, the Territory’s net debt under the Uniform Presentation scope was $1416m, an increase of $122m from 1999-2000. This is basically in line with the Public Account underlying budget outcome of $140m increase because the broader Uniform Presentation scope removes the positive impact of the Conditions of Service Trust transfer.
The Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report includes the Auditor-General’s Report providing a two part audit opinion. The first part provides an opinion on whether the statement is prepared from proper accounts and is presented fairly in accordance with the Financial Management Act. The second part provides an opinion on whether the statements have been prepared in accordance with applicable Australian accounting standards.
Australian Accounting Standard 31, applicable to whole-of-government public sector reporting, became operative in 1998-99. Compliance with the standard is not a legal requirement and the previous government chose not to comply with this standard. This made public scrutiny and assessment of fiscal outcomes much less transparent and more difficult than today’s community expects and deserves. Indeed, in contrast to the former government, my government believes that Territorians deserve the truth in how their taxes are collected and spent, and reported in ways that are more readily understood. We are all here to represent the community and to work in partnership with them.
I have foreshadowed the introduction of the fiscal integrity and transparency legislation during these sittings. This bill provides for open and transparent financial reporting and requires that fiscal reporting be based on external fiscal reporting standards that are independent of the government of the day. These standards include the accrual government finance statistics as well as the Australian Accounting Standards. While there is a 12 month period to provide for the transition to accrual reporting, the report in respect of the 2002-03 year should see compliance with Australian Accounting Standard 31.
I table the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report for 2000-01 which includes the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Statement.
Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the report.
Mr REED (Katherine): Madam Speaker, I take the opportunity to make some comments in relation to the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report. Much of the information, of course, that the Treasurer has just provided the House is already is publicly available notwithstanding that she is trying to present a ‘new broom sweeps clean’ approach here, and a feeling of comfort for everyone. There are issues that she has just taken credit for which were already in train by the former government in terms of the new accounting processes and reporting processes that the former government had announced and, indeed, was moving towards. So it is rather trite of her to try to take credit for it in terms of they’re all her new and wonderful bright ideas when they have, in fact, been announced.
There is detailed reference made to them in the budget debate and, indeed, in the budget speech that that action would have been proceeding in any event.
Ms Martin interjecting.
Mr REED: We listened to you quietly, so I would ask, Madam Speaker, for the same courtesies.
In terms of the matters to which the Treasurer refers, and trying to take credit for them and portray to the Northern Territory populace that she is introducing new measures that are going to be more open, more accountable and more answerable to the public, well, they were already underway. Anyone who has read the budget speech would be familiar with the new processes to which the honourable minister has just referred and the detail, indeed, which is in the budget documents for the year 2001-02 which themselves demonstrate a transition to the new reporting processes and the new requirements in terms of working for outcomes and the processes that were underway within and across government before the current government was elected. It ill behoves the Treasurer now to try to take credit for those initiatives.
It is fair to say that we are the last jurisdiction to move in that regard. But as I have explained, formerly as Treasurer, there was good reason for that. Those actions were taken in relation to the activities of the Northern Territory. One does not have to blindly follow interstate examples or initiatives in relation to how this government does anything. It is best for the government of the day, I believe, to determine what the appropriate processes are for the Territory rather than being dictated to by some interstate authority. That was very much the pressure with, for example, accrual accounting that former governments experienced. Earlier this year I announced, as Treasurer, that we would be proceeding as a government to introduce accrual accounting, and in fact that was included in the budget speech, and is another reason why the Chief Minister now cannot take credit for it, and we did it at a time that suited the Territory.
In terms of introducing accrual accounting historically, that is if it had been done five, six or more years ago, it would have been at a considerable cost. One of the benefits for proceeding to it now is that it has been achieved by other jurisdictions. That process has been applied, in some cases, for many years and the Territory is now able to move to accrual accounting using the experience that was gained by other jurisdictions, perhaps adopting some of the processes and practices that have been used by other jurisdictions and, in so doing, being able to do it at a much lower cost than would have been the case had we moved to it earlier. In any event, it is arguable, and I guess it depends on to which accounting school you attach your views, whether or not it is appropriate in any event. But the fact is that those initiatives that the Treasurer has just taken credit for were well in place before the Treasurer adopted the role that she now holds.
Ms Martin: Tell us about the Conditions of Service Trust.
Mr REED: The question of the Conditions of Service Trust I am more than happy to address.
Ms Martin interjecting.
Mr REED: It is interesting to note, and I pick up the interjection from the Treasurer, that for many years it had been suggested by no lesser an authority than the Auditor-General, that the Conditions of Service Trust should be brought onto budget. For their own reasons, the previous government did not do that, quite rightly. It was an appropriate course of action to have the Conditions of Service Trust outside budget. But, again, as I explained in the budget speech, because there was a move in transition to accrual accounting, which will be fully in place at the commencement of next financial year, and because the payments for the railway were made - and I remind Madam Speaker and honourable members that the payment for the railway was made from the Conditions of Service Trust, and most of that money came, of course, from the sale of the Ayers Rock Resort, about $100m in that regard which had been held in the Conditions of Service Trust so that it was set aside in the event that the railway was concluded, the negotiations, which they were successfully by the CLP government and Territorians are now reaping the benefit of it in terms of its construction. Given that that payment was made from the Conditions of Service Trust for the railway and that that left a residual amount in the Conditions of Service Trust of about $150m, it was considered appropriate at the time of preparing the 2001-02 budget, in the context of moving towards accrual accounting, that all of the Conditions of Service Trust be brought onto the budget. Otherwise, that part that was contributing towards the railway would have been moved onto budget this year, and the remainder would have had to be brought on next year, so why not do it in one clean step rather than progressively over time. It surprises me a little that the Auditor-General is somewhat critical of bringing it on to budget when there were calls in the past from him, and his office, to do so.
So I am happy to address the question of the Conditions of Service Trust. If the Treasurer thinks that that is an embarrassment, it was quite a logical move and it was quite strongly supported by Treasury.
In terms of the other matters she raises with great theatrical presentation, and in terms of the $149m, and this is a concern and something else is a concern, they were all reported in the budget papers. They were foreshadowed and advised to Territorians. That she should now try to present the fact as one that was concealed from Territorians, and we will get into that debate when we are talking about the Auditor-General’s report, is perhaps a demonstration that she is not across her job in terms of just what has been made publicly aware to Territorians, and what the facts are, and that she is really scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of trying to take credit for things that were already initiated, commenced, and well intended to proceed by the former government in any event.
Madam Speaker, I just say that it is time that the government recognise that they are now in government and they have to start making some decisions on behalf of Territorians. If you want to continue as a government playing blame politics, and looking in the rear vision mirror and being more concerned with what happened in the past rather than focussing on what is going to be an advantage in terms of the initiatives that you are going to introduce and pursue for Territorians, then that I think is what the business community is looking for.
A member: The black hole.
Mr REED: The interjection in relation to black holes - the business community, the contractors who are phoning me and leaving messages at my office, and taking the time to contact other members of the opposition - what they are concerned about is what the government is going to do.
Their message very clearly is: ‘We don’t care about black holes. We don’t care about what the interpretation of the current government is in relation to what they want to do as regards political gain. We are concerned that the government is now delaying the capital works project. We are concerned, as contractors, that in terms of creating work and keeping all our employees rather than having to lay them off, that there is tinkering now with the contract arrangements.’ There is a growing number of contractors each day who are contacting opposition members in relation to the new arrangements that are being put in place, the watering down of period contracts and the fact that contractors are having to now face the prospect of delayed payments. They may well win a contract, but whilst the tender documents call for commencement of a project within a month or six weeks of winning the tender, they are being advised, and there are now many examples before us, that whilst they have won the contract they cannot start work for some months, in some cases early next year. However, the contractor has to carry the cost of that impost of whatever increases occur between now and then, because there has been advice that they will not be allowed to put in for allowances for increased costs in the meantime. So, that is what Territorians are waiting to hear from this government.
They do not care about a summit. It is interesting to note that some of the participants in the summit, only a few months ago, were being referred to as members of a silver circle. How things change in a matter of time and how the Chief Minister can have one opinion in relation to particular individuals on one occasion, and after an election completely change that view and then look upon them quite differently. Similarly, with the attitude that she has adopted in relation to the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report. So, they are the challenges that the government now faces in relation to where they are going to carry the Northern Territory to, not what has happened in the past. Do you think for a moment that, had the CLP retained government, we would be walking around aimlessly, with offices closing, with shops and restaurants closing, with contractors laying off staff?
One contractor called me on Friday, after she saw the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure Development on television news last week, answering a question in relation to contracts that keep people employed in the Territory, standing up here and referring across the Chamber to ‘you idiots’. Well, that is not the image that hard working business men and women of the Northern Territory want to see of their ministers, creating jobs for Territorians, because that is not constructive. There is a great deal of fear and apprehension in the community following the 11 September incident and, although it happened in New York, that has permeated right throughout the world and the Northern Territory is no exception to that.
The Territory business community is looking for guidance. They are looking for the government to continue letting contracts in a way that will enable them to get on with the job and retain the number of employees that they already have, and what are they getting? They are getting contracts that won’t be honoured in terms of the tender document, that is start within a month, but being advised if they win the contract they will not be able to start in January. Now, there is at least one contractor who said, ‘I can not live with that and I hand the contract back’, and there are other contractors who have had to lay off their staff. One rang my office on Friday, and I spoke to him about his 10 employees, which he is reducing down to two, and he faces dire consequences because there are no decisions being made by this government in relation to means by which people can be …
Ms Martin: What a load of rubbish. Absolute load of rubbish.
Mr REED: …The Treasurer and Chief Minister interjects and says rubbish. I ask her to check what is happening with the tender arrangements, because the minister does not know. The minister’s answer was ‘you idiots, you idiots’. Well, can I say, after seeing the minister on television last week, I am a great supporter of televising of Question Time, because it is getting the message across to Territory businessmen and businesswomen in a way better than the opposition could ever do it. It sent the shivers through contractors, men and business women of the Northern Territory, last Thursday night when they saw the minister responsible for generating jobs and economic activity in the Northern Territory not responding in a way that was at all positive.
That is what people are looking for after 11 September. They are looking for guidance from the government. They are looking for a continuance of the ability to gain government work, and do not underestimate, Madam Speaker - and I know that you would not - the importance of the government work program, capital works, repairs and maintenance, and the ongoing period contracts to the Northern Territory economy. They have stalled, and they have stalled not for good reason. They have stalled because this government has priorities of its own which it wants to introduce. That is quite expected of a new government. But what they should have is the ability and the courage to stand up and say, ‘We are going to change our priorities’, not, ‘Oh, we have to change our priorities because of black holes and because of CLP successive governments…’, and all of these historical things that they are trying to drag forward. They are simply being used as a screen and a reason for them to be able to be - at the same time in the background - reordering their priorities, being able to come out and announce them after a summit and blame the summit, the CLP, the black hole, for introducing new taxes or for increasing charges or for scrapping a particular activity of the former government which hey really should have the courage to announce themselves as one of their own priorities.
If they are going to scrap a particular activity that was pursued by the former government, I think Territorians would wear that, because they understand that there is now a new government. They might not accept it, but they would understand that a new government would have new priorities. Well, if you have new priorities, have the courage to stand up before Territorians and explain to them what those new priorities are.
Territorians are not into blame politics. They are into looking to where they are going and what you, as a government, is going to do to help them get there, to sustain their businesses, to continue employing Territorians and to continue generating activity across the Northern Territory economy. The sooner this government recognises that, the better. I have broad shoulders: I do not care if they blame me for black holes, for all sorts of other things that they want to do. It is only a matter of time I think before they blame me for 11 September. They blame me for everything else, and it is only a matter of time before they suggest that I have been working as a cohort of Bin Laden’s, and that I am responsible also for the World Trade fiasco and the dreadful occurrences there, and the consequences that that has had on not only the American economy but the world economy, and the fact that we felt that here.
I call upon the government to be able to focus on the needs of Territorians, focus on the future. Let the capital works program continue to flow because contractors, whilst hearing the utterances of the government in terms of, ‘We are honouring the former government’s capital works programs’, know they are not. What happens when contractors win a contract through the tender process and are subsequently told, ‘The goods news is you have won the contract. The bad news is you cannot start within the time that it said in the tender documents – four to seven weeks, but you can start in January next year’, and when the contractor subsequently asks, ‘Okay, well, I might be able to live with that. Is there any opportunity for me to take into account increased costs that might accrue in the interim?’ Madam Speaker, you are aware of the volatility of just one item, fuel costs, in terms of those issues that contractors have to face in these times of uncertainty. And the answer comes back from the government, ‘No’. Well, do not fool yourselves that the contracting fraternity is happy.
Do not fool yourselves that the small contractors across the Northern Territory are happy with your summit, because they largely see themselves, as one told me on the phone last Friday, as left out of the summit. You can have the summit on the Internet, you can have it sent with messages through carrier pigeons, you can nail summit documents to light poles in the northern suburbs, in Tennant Creek and in Alice Springs, but the small contractors are having a tough time because of your indecision. They are out there trying to earn a quid. They are out there trying to keep their employees employed. They are out there not trying to reduce their employees, as one from Darwin told me last Friday from 10 to two, and they do not give a fig about your summit. They do not care, and the reason they do not care is because they just do not have time to commit themselves on a Sunday, Monday and a Tuesday to some talkfest.
If you think for one moment that a contractor is going to take the time to come in here and say, ‘I do not agree with the introduction of a land tax’, well, it is just a nonsense. You do not have to get the business community sitting around a table to say that they do not want a land tax. The answer is self-evident, and the answer should be self-evident to you in relation to what the business community is thinking at the moment. Have a walk down the mall and have a look at the office space that is available; have a look at the shops that are closing. A journalist recently told me during the course of an interview, ‘I went to get lunch yesterday and walked in the door of the building where I normally get lunch, and the food outlet that I normally get my lunch was closed, gone, finished’. That is the picture that this government has to address.
The CLP, as a government re-elected, would not have fallen in a big hole in the way that this government has. The activities of government would have continued. In terms of being in government, the other thing that you have to recognise as a new Labor government, is that you have to be innovative. If you see these problems, do not walk around wringing your hands; you have to find some answers to it.
The most recent example that I could give to you of some innovation was the QuickStart program which, I see in a media report recently, was successful beyond all expectations. There was a view that if the QuickStart program was successful, it would have been responsible for the construction of 100 new homes, and if we could reach the target of 100 then that would have been exceedingly successful. I noticed a media report recently where, in fact, it looks like the outcome is something like 220. That is innovation. That is a way that a government can, without interfering in business - which is what you are doing with your process - that is, creating an enormous amount of doubt and concern right across the business community and threatening them with land taxes; threatening them with increased electricity, water, sewerage and other charges; threatening them with the red tape and the administrative burden of a land tax, which is a very burdensome arrangement and way to raise money, they are creating concerns. What you have to do as a government is to be innovative and act in a way that will engender confidence in the business community, and be innovative in a way that will generate economic activity across the community. So have a look at the QuickStart program. You might want to reintroduce it. It may be well worth the consideration of giving it another run, because that is what government is all about, or what it should be all about. It should be about facilitating activity in the business community. It should be about facilitating the construction industry, in that case, to get on with the job and to provide them with additional work.
It is worthy of note that the construction of 220 homes that came out of the QuickStart innovative program cost $1m. In terms of 100 homes, I think the value of their construction from memory was $20m. Yet, the program, in fact, generated 220 homes by that report in the NT News. So it generated something in the order of $50m worth of construction industry activity across the Northern Territory. That is the type of program that this government should be focussing on. They have to become innovative. They have to start generating some ideas that are going to be able to help Territorians remain in business, and to be able to continue employing Territorians and those Territorians who are struggling to achieve that - and that is where the engine room of the economy is: it is out in the business sector.
It is not in this Chamber. It is not in government, notwithstanding that government can play a very important role to facilitate the engine room of the economy and bearing in mind that it is the small business community that generates most of that activity, and that is what this government should be focusing on. They do not care one little sniff about black holes; they do not care about the historical events of what happened before. They do remember that when there was a CLP government, if a problem arose in the construction industry, they would have a QuickStart program to generate work.
If a problem arose in historical terms as to a problem with the larger construction industry such as it was in the early 1990s when this program was started to build this Parliament House and the precinct and the court house, that the government facilitated activity within the private sector and it got things going. Well, they are waiting for this government to get things going and they are very frustrated that the government, notwithstanding the fact that they can get together the legislation to get rid of mandatory sentencing, however important it was to the Labor government, it was not important to the contractors who are trying to keep the economy going.
They were able to find time to do that. They were able to find, I expect, an enormous amount of time to organise a sorry day. Well, the real priority is with the economy. The rhetoric that the Treasurer just went on with is hollow nonsense in terms of what the community expect and how you are going to be innovative enough to keep creating jobs in the Territory, but all the rhetoric of the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report, is nothing because it gives nothing and delivers no jobs to Territorians. The contractors and the business community will remember you for your lack of innovation.
Motion agreed to; paper noted.
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I table a draft Information Bill 2001 together with a discussion paper inviting comment on the proposed legislation.
Madam Speaker, Territory Labor has long espoused the principle of open and accountable government. One of the Labor government’s key initiatives in this area is the development of an Information Bill. This bill will provide a framework for the management of government information in the Northern Territory. It will cover access to government information, privacy principles for information and records management principles in government in a one-piece legislation.
Before I provide honourable members with some detail of the proposed legislation, it is fair to say that from this government’s point of view, this legislation should have been enacted in the Territory years ago. Territorians for many years have understood that when Territory Labor assumed government, legislation to provide Territorians with access to personal and government information should be very high on the agenda, and so it is.
It is with an enormous sense of pride that I table this discussion draft Information Bill and the accompanying discussion paper in this first parliamentary sittings of the Labor government. The proposed information legislation is unique in many respects, but two are worthy of note. The first is that this one piece of legislation deals with a number of aspects dealt with in separate pieces of legislation elsewhere. This proposal, in one bill, includes access to personal and government information, the privacy principles that govern personal information held in both public and in some areas of the private sector, and a legislative regime for keeping and managing government records. The draft bill is also unique in that it is not driven by paper-based economy as is most similar legislation throughout Australia. This draft bill is driven by an information-based economy. Accordingly, it will place the Territory in a competitive advantage over other jurisdictions.
There is one more feature that I wish to draw to the attention of honourable members. That feature is that the proposed model is based on the resolving of disputes on applications for access to information or breaches of privacy principles, not by the courts but rather by a statutory appointed Information Commissioner who will mediate the resolution of disputes. Such an approach is certainly less litigious and is likely to be less costly to the community. Again, there is no similar legislation in Australia that can claim such innovation. This proposed legislation is cutting edge and reflects world’s best practice in those areas covered in the draft bill.
Turning to more detail in the discussion draft, honourable members will note that there are four main components to the bill. They are:
The draft bill is premised on all government and personal information being accessible. However, there are categories of information that it may be in the public interest not to disclose.
This Labor government will be distinguished by its consultation with the Territory community. We want Territorians to have a say in this draft bill. To that end there will be public information sessions on the content of the draft bill in both public and private sectors throughout the Territory between now and the end of the year. There will be broad consultation with the Territory community on its views of the proposed legislation. The government is determined Territorians will have input to the draft bill and accordingly the closing date for any comments will be 28 February 2002.
I believe that this draft bill provides Territorians with a model of privacy principles and an access to government and personal information regime and a framework of accountable and responsible government records management that is, by any measure, world’s best practice. The proposed bill is at the cutting edge for such legislation and is far superior to any other legislation in Australia, particularly as its focus is the information age and economy, and the 21st century.
Madam Speaker, I look forward to Territorians’ comments on the bill and I look forward, after taking account of all the comments received, to introducing in the first half of the year 2002 an Information Bill for Territorians.
Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the paper.
Mr BURKE (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, it is pleasing at last to get a copy of this draft bill. I note the minister’s comments in introducing this draft legislation. The only thing missing from his comments was to provide heartfelt thanks to the efforts of the previous government in bringing forward what he has described as cutting edge legislation.
If you were honest with Territorians, you would accept and admit that this cutting edge legislation is the work of the CLP government but obviously it will take time to digest what actually has been brought forward. It is good to see that the Information Commissioner has been included as being a person who acts in a similar role to the Ombudsman. I have not, in a quick perusal of this draft legislation, seen whether or not the Commissioner has his own reference powers to seek FOI. I will look at that in due course. But in a general sense, as this is a draft bill out for public discussion, the opposition will peruse it. I seek leave to continue my remarks at a later hour.
Leave granted.
Debate adjourned.
Continued from 18 October 2001.
Mr DUNHAM (Drysdale): Madam Speaker, the Address-in-Reply is a very important debate. It sets the directions of government and it is a debate that enunciates to, not just researchers but to those people who have been in the thick of an election, just what government intends to do having won. It is interesting when you read the Address-in-Reply, it is a little bit schizophrenic in terms of the contributions by members opposite. The rhetoric that was used in describing the directions of the new government did have a flavour of the election promises that were made and it is also interesting that on Tuesday, 16 October, those promises were broken within hours. What we have here is the hallmarks of a fledgling government which has been able to go to an election and secure the numbers necessary to make government in this House which, within very short time, was going backwards at a million miles an hour on some of those promises. It is my intention to track these promises because they will make worthwhile fodder for not only future elections but also for the integrity and honour of this government when it is judged again.
It is not my intention to be very long in this debate but I will point out that if people look to the maiden speeches, to the speech by His Honour the Administrator and to the speeches made by members of the government who have been in the House previous to the election, you will see a great many accolades for the previous government. They occur in a variety of ways, generally to do with lifestyle. People who arrived late on the scene like, for instance, the current Chief Minister who came here and fell in love with this place and decided that this was where she would live, she enjoyed the lifestyle, she enjoyed our multiculturalism, she enjoyed our natural attributes, she enjoyed the trappings that had been provided to the citizenry by government.
That stuff, as I have pointed out once before, does not happen by accident. In fact, the government put in an enormous amount of money into sporting facilities like the Marrara Sporting Stadium. There are many of us in this House who have used those facilities. The closure of some of the rivers and the confidence that Territorians and visitors to this place, because it is a growing tourism market, can go to our waterways and catch a fish. The multiculturalism and the resources that are being provided to a variety of ethnic groups in this place and the ease with which government …
Mr Henderson: Well, why did you preference One Nation?
Mr DUNHAM: I think a contribution has been made by the member for Wanguri and his contribution can stand in parliament, rather than by way of interjection.
The first point is that there are a number of accolades for government there and I think we are going to get another run this afternoon when the health minister is going to make an attempt to say how wonderful things are in health but how they had nothing to do with the government but rather an array of public servants who did things in spite of the government. It is a theme that we will see that is in keeping with some of the rhetoric of finding a scapegoat, and the scapegoat inevitably will be us.
Let’s move to the things that can be broadly categorised as rhetoric and propaganda and, in some places, distortions of the truth and fraud. I go to the very commencement of the debate where one talks about priority areas, and it occurs within a very short space of His Honour the Administrator’s speech. It talks about the priorities of my government - so it is right up the top – ‘…will be to reinforce and enhance the necessary open and accountable democratic structures, in other words to provide good government’. ‘Good Government’ is also a label that occurred on the cover of one of their documents in the campaign that described how they would set up the machinery of government. Interestingly, we quickly moved after that into debate about good government and a reneging was seen immediately.
At lunchtime, Mr Deputy Speaker, the member for Greatorex, yourself and I will with members of the government comprise the Public Accounts Committee. The Public Accounts Committee was discussed in this House many times and it has done some very very good work. As described prior to the election, you and I would have been going to a meeting that comprised even numbers of government and opposition, and that elected its own chair, and it could take motions of its own finding. They are pretty important elements; they were described in a fairly transparent way and they are now missing. So that particular backflip is pretty important because it was seen not only as a very high priority in His Honour the Administrator’s speech, not only was it a document that was paraded before the people, it has been taken to this parliament, it has been taken that this parliament has done something in a covert way that no other parliament did and that the new broom would come in and fix that. Well they have not, and that is only one of them.
The difficulty we have had as an opposition is that there are not many documents we can go to. The primary source documents I guess are the promises that were made and we now have a series of reneging all the way through. The other thing that we have is the so-called Access Economics Report and the clean bill of health. We have two documents from Professor Percy Allan, so we are up to several documents. We have some press releases and we have this parliament. It is very interesting that there are massive contradictions in all these documents. The one that I would be most interested in is whether the Percy Allan report provides the primary source document for the government. In the event that it does, we can jettison some of the others that contradict Percy Allan and we can concentrate on that particular document. One of the difficulties we have is the current government is working off three or four documents that are in total disagreement with each other. I would be happy to work from the Professor Percy Allan report. I understand that it is mooted that it be the source document for the coming Economic Summit, and we could cut to the chase pretty quickly if we accept that the government will implement Percy Allan’s report. Percy Allan has been widely quoted about his discovery of this famous black hole and if that is the only portion that the government wants to hang on to, come out and say that - one portion that we will hang on to; the rest of it is actually rubbish.
Alternatively, they may wish to pursue Professor Percy Allan’s report. We know that they have already jettisoned the land tax; we hear sounds that that is the case. We hope, too, that they will jettison some of the other things that Professor Percy Allan has in there but we would like that to be stated for the obvious reasons.
The maiden speeches I thought were reasonably good. We are yet to hear from the member for Barkly. I believe that it is important for this House to hear those maiden speeches because they do set the tenor for an incoming member, what they personally believe they will do and what they will achieve, and their belief systems. For that reason I thought it was really important that as a parliament we attend to those in the normal Westminster tradition of quietly hearing what they had to say without interruption. I was disappointed, because it also is a further indicator of the contempt with which this House is held by the new Chief Minister that she not only walked in and out, she spoke while her new members were speaking. She walked to and fro in front of them and that she had various pieces of very important paper that she had to parade in and out of the House.
Dr TOYNE: A point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. The member knows that he cannot refer to the presence or absence of a member in the House. I would ask him to withdraw.
Mr DUNHAM: I am happy to, Mr Deputy Speaker. I shall not refer to her absence in and out of the House. I was merely referring to her lack of good behaviour when her own members were making their maiden speeches. Those who spoke would be aware that, in the main, the entire opposition sat and listened and, as I said, I think that is very important.
There were a couple of things in their speeches which I think are flaws in how they have been briefed or how they perceive things. I am hopeful that this House will be instrumental in educating some of those new members because some of the language that was used was intemperate and not factual. I think that if you have the opportunity to go back to those maiden speeches at some future time perhaps with some more wisdom you will be able to see that.
One of the words I will pick up was from the member for Millner where he used the word ‘illegitimate’ to describe the government. From somebody who purports to be a lawyer they should know what the word illegitimate means and the legitimacy of the previous government is pretty much the same as the legitimacy of this government. We have both been elected by a process, the process is democratic and the process is entirely legitimate. That kind of reflection on our parliamentary systems and democracy does not do him good. It may well be that he was speaking passionately to an audience or a gallery and the word slipped out, but I caution him to be careful with that sort of language because, in this House it goes down forever. This is on the permanent public record. It could well be that his grandchildren are elected to here and they will read that speech and I think it would be a good thing, too. In all likelihood they may represent a different party if the Labor government does what we think it will do and cause such problems for this place that they disappear without a trace.
Various members spoke about how they came to power and they thanked various people. I was really quite surprised that, by omission, the One Nation Party was not mentioned, because I recall seeing the new member for Casuarina, with the euphoria of the night, attributing that as one of the major factors for his election, and since the election they have gone very quiet on it. I, too, do not really like to talk about the One Nation Party because I think you only give them oxygen. They are an irrelevance. How they do business is not something that attracts me to them. But it should be put on the record that they were a major feature in the election of the Labor Party. I am surprised that those opposite did not use it to describe truly and factually how they obtained office because, certainly in the case of the member for Millner, it was a significant factor.
When you come to this House, there is a great honour, and the honour is to work for the benefit of Territorians, all the people, including members of One Nation, surprisingly, and there is also, when you leave, a few things that come with it. One of them, often spoken about in the press, and that is this wondrous superannuation. I have never inquired to any great length to find out what that is, but we are well remunerated here and well remunerated on exit. The other thing is the great satisfaction, particularly of being in government and if you have been a minister, of the things that you have done. I know on this side we have great pride in the things we have done. Many of us can stand up and catalogue them, can catalogue our own personal attachment to them or involvement in them, and that is quite a buzz, to be able to be in this place and contribute to its benefit.
The other thing that one could take is honour, and that is a commodity that those currently in government should look at carefully, because it is a commodity that is a bit like virginity. It can be squandered and having been squandered it is very difficult to retrieve. Some of the members opposite should look at that. They should look at the fact that they had a racist element to their campaign, something that enabled them to woo voters. I, again, do not really like to talk about the One Nation Party because it only gives them a status they do not deserve, but it definitely was a factor. It is something that those opposite should look at, particularly given that they take a great puritan attitude about their access to a variety of ethnic groups in the community, but to be elected on a racist campaign is something they will live with. It is a thing that has been thrown across this Chamber many times. It does offend me because I have been to election on a number of occasions, including for people who are initiated ceremony men and at the end of that election, been accused of running a racist campaign, which left me quite astonished.
It is a good thing for this parliament to see the colour of the Chinese New Year and the dragon coming and blessing this House, to see the member for Arafura escorted into the place, but we have to be careful that these are not mere theatrics and rhetoric. We have to be careful that we actually do pursue policies that are not racist. I am very proud to be able to say that I have been connected with the CLP in many elections and we do not, and have not, played the so-called race card ...
Mr Ah Kit interjecting.
Mr DUNHAM: This is interesting, I was involved in the campaign that saw the member for Arnhem elected to this parliament, and our two Aboriginal candidates, Mujiji Nungarggull and Terry Yumbulul, were both very surprised that the Labor Party made some sort of allegation that they had run a racist campaign. But, on the other hand, the member for Arnhem had - we did obtain a statutory declaration on this, though it is all water under the bridge now - talked to people about the loss of their land, the loss of unemployment benefits, the desecration of sacred sites and all that other rhetoric that is taken out in the form of push polling to Aboriginal communities. I have seen it myself in action. The member for Arnhem also talked about the ceremony man. We talked to Bernard Tipiloura when he stood in the seat of Arafura and we asked how he would like to be known, and he said, ‘I would like to be known as I am’. He said, ‘I am a man who is proud of his ceremony, and I am a ceremony man’. That was his slogan - Bernard Tipiloura, a ceremony man. And it was seen to be a racist campaign. It was seen to be a racist campaign for this man to describe something that he had immense pride in, that he was very proud of and that he thought he brought to this parliament as a unique and special attribute of his own.
Females stand and they say, ‘Vote for me; I am a woman’. I do not think that is a gender bigotry thing; I think it is people describing the particular traits they can bring to this parliament. So, I think we should revisit the campaign just for those couple of things. I shan’t speak to all the maiden speeches, but I would advise members to re-read what they said. The new minister for health who claims that upon seeing naked people she is well equipped for the job, I would suggest that she has a few more hoops to jump through rather than just seeing the naked male form, and if it was that easy she can buy books to do that sort of stuff.
In my own case, I am very pleased to be the shadow minister for health and community services, and the shadow member for essential services, because I think I can make a good contribution. The member would know that I have not sought to attach media comment to the issues I have brought to her attention. I am disappointed that it has now been some time since the election and she has not seen fit to answer those questions which are now building up.
I note that the bill we have before us, the Information Bill, talks in great glowing terms about how you can get information out of the government. Well, I can tell you, it ain’t that easy. I like the business about where you write to the departments and they answer within 30 days. If they do not answer within 30 days, it is taken as a refusal. This is brilliant, because if you work on the basis of this bill that is here as a discussion paper, pretty much the letters I have written to the current health minister could be taken as a refusal to answer those issues. I will give a pledge here that I will try to work collaboratively and in concert. It is my hope that the current government does not muck up as badly as I fear they may. The optimist in me hopes that the current government will struggle through and things won’t be as bad as I think they may well be, because I do not think we can afford to have a calamity on our hands. The hiatus that we have had now, with two months of inaction, is very dangerous. It is very bad, not only for business and commercial interests, but it is bad for public service, the confidence of this place and other issues, and I would urge that they get on with the task.
I will make every attempt to be collaborative in my approach. I shan’t use the same methodology that was employed by the opposition, and I am quite happy to say that right at the forefront. One of the things that can make you a sitting duck as a health minister is when people bring in tragic stories and say, ‘How are you going to fix it?’ The unfortunate reality in the health sector is often there are things you cannot fix. Often there are things in human services that even the best result is still something that causes all of us some grief, even those who are players in it, merely part players.
So, I shan’t be adopting the method of the member for Wanguri where he brought things of that ilk in and used the calamitous circumstances in people’s own lives, or their own health status, as a rock to throw at government. Interestingly, most of those cases were treated a bit like a dirty tissue and discarded immediately he had achieved his end, which was to have a whack at the government.
I will point out that one of the letters I have on the minister’s desk is a letter about the Patient Assisted Travel scheme. It is quite a good scheme that operated under the previous government. It was certainly, compared to other places, generous and it afforded Territorians the right of access that others take for granted. If you read Hansard and the contributions of the member for Wanguri, you will see that he thought that there should be some political interference in that. I would seek right at the outset that that is not the case, that it be based on a medical rather than a political judgment. I would seek that the new health minister make some of those comments early so that people do not believe that the system has now changed to such an extent that it replicates that, that the now government used when they were in opposition.
I am also very pleased to have the portfolio area of essential services, and I am pleased to see that it seems to be business as usual. It is good that we are moving towards a corporate structure for the Power and Water Authority. It is a remarkably efficient organisation. The things that were problems in that area, and were used in this parliament to somehow denigrate government, will continue to be problems; there will continue to be trees that grow fast and fall over on power lines, there will continue to be lightning strikes, there will continue to be flying foxes in Katherine that take out the power. I shall not be laying those at the feet of government. In the case of the flying foxes in Katherine, the Power and Water Authority moved very quickly to remedy the problem. It is an organisation that will continue to do that; they will continue to put their best efforts in place.
There are some dilemmas I have with regard to some of the promises that were made: power to Dundee, for instance; the undergrounding of power at the cost of some $80m; the promise to keep the power price at the same level for the next four years. These are things that I would like to see some firm assurances on, because they actually do contradict largely what Professor Percy said. He said that they should be run on commercial, not political lines. I am happy to find the quote in the papers for members opposite if they have not seen it. But those decisions made as political promises are exactly that, they are political promises. They are not commercial promises. I can tell you the Power and Water Authority would not present me with a works list that had Dundee Beach right up the top, nor the undergrounding of power in the leafy northern suburbs.
So having made those political promises, I am very keen to see how they will be pursued. If it is government’s intention to renege, sure, I will make a noise about it because I think that they fibbed to the electorate. I think they should, in their repertoire of options, put that in: ‘We told the punters some dumb things. We are now in government. We realise they are dumb, we are not going to do it’. That should be among their repertoire of options. Like the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, I think they should be able to just say it. I do not think they should have to say, ‘Look, there is a black hole’, or, ‘We thought the power was going to cost this’, or, ‘We thought we were going to sell hole-in-the-ground technology’ or whatever it is. Just say it. Make decisions and say it because one of the things you are going to find in government is that many people do not like what you do. You are not going to be loved by everybody all the time. You are going to have to make decisions that are on the best basis for all of the Territory and for all of its citizens, so you should go ahead and do that.
In the time remaining, I would like to talk about my electorate of Drysdale. The electorate of Drysdale is the electorate that changed most during the last election. Although there were other electorates that changed vastly on a geographic basis, and I count in this the member for Stuart’s electorate, the electorate which he said that he could not adequately service. I will be interested to know whether he still has those sentiments that he told, not only this parliament but the Electoral Redistribution Committee, that he was incapable of servicing that electorate. I think it is a very difficult thing to be sitting there now as the member for Stuart having made the admission that it was beyond your capabilities.
So notwithstanding his boundary changes, my changes were more demographic which is, after all, why we are here. Mine was more to do with people. There was a significant change that now sees me just around the corner here in Woolner Road and all the way out to the Elizabeth River Bridge. Indeed, I am a neighbours of yours, Mr Deputy Speaker. Largely, the population is in Palmerston, where I will be seeking to move my office. I will say for the Parliamentary Record, that it is taking longer than I would like, but certainly, as soon as I can get out to Palmerston with my electorate office, that is where I will be. It remains a very important infrastructure base for the Territory. Indeed the port is there, a large lump of the harbour, major arterials into Darwin, the inter-modal change, the terminal of the railway, they will all be in the electorate. So it is something that is very important in terms of my electoral workload, not just to carry those things that relate to the people that live in the suburbs of Drysdale, but also those businesses that have many millions of dollars tied up there. It encompasses Berrimah, Winnellie, and as I said, the port and the TDZ. I will make it my business to make sure I know the issues that confront those people. Many of them I know already, and I will be making a point of making sure that their interface with government is good. If it cannot be achieved by direct approach then possibly, it can through me.
The last couple of things I will say is that, I am in this parliament as an elected member and a former minister, but in a previous life I was an advisor. I think that that is where I have some skill and ability to give something to the government. I can visit this in future debates, but for this debate it is really important that we look forward. It is really important that we grab the issues, we grab the opportunities, we are focused on the horizon, we are looking out five and 10 years, not just what is happening now, what we have to do before the next election, because that is the legacy that those opposite inherited. They inherited a legacy of very forward looking governments - governments that built the university before its time; governments that built this place probably before its time; governments that were not satisfied with how the Commonwealth ran things and grappled it with both hands.
This is a government that introduced more local government than any other place. There were only four municipal councils when you came here, Mr Deputy Speaker. Indeed, the council that you left as President of, just recently, was established in the period of stewardship of the CLP government. So, we have left a great legacy for them, and the greatest legacy is our ability to look into the future and to look at opportunities that might be out 10 or 15 years. I would urge them that they do that as their first and foremost thing, and also that they look to the domestic situation that occurs now and their capacity to benefit it. How to benefit it is clarity on issues, confidence in government directions, discarding the things that are nonsensical or that it has decided not to pursue, good government management, and also spending that enormous amount of money which occurs in the budget, largely which flows back into the community and which has to be spent as a matter of some priority.
Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I look forward to future opportunities to address the parliament. They seem to be fewer and fewer these days, and later and later. But it would contribute largely to debates if the government could enshrine those things they want to hold, and alert us to the things that they want to jettison because an enormous amount of time could be spent pursuing some of the nonsense that is in Percy Allan’s report and other reports, and it could be obviated merely by them saying, ‘Sorry, we ain’t going to do that’.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Mr Deputy Speaker, I seek leave to make my remarks from your table, because I notice there is no microphone here and Hansard may have difficulty hearing me.
Leave granted.
Mrs BRAHAM: I want to make it quite clear that I am standing to give my Address-in-Reply as the member for Braitling, not as the Speaker. As the Speaker, I do not intend to participate in debates, but I certainly do want to get on the public record some of my thoughts about the last 11 months.
I am pleased to be back in the Chamber. The last 11 months have been quite full of downs and ups for myself and my family. But what I have learnt throughout this period is that Territorians have a strong sense of justice and fair play, and that is why I am back here and not the CLP candidate for Braitling.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mrs BRAHAM: They disliked intensely what the CLP did to me and have continued to do with their candidates ever since then. The CLP seems to have lost that sense of community that they used to have and have certainly lost their support base, particularly in the Alice Springs branch from where I came. I personally think they have been left with what I would call the power-mad, egotistical people. They have lost the good, decent people. They have actually walked away. All they have left are the dregs.
It was not easy to come in here in February and sit as an Independent, particularly after the public humiliation and threats that had been made against me and particularly as most of my former colleagues would not even look me in the eye, acknowledge me or talk to me. I felt very much like a leper. I have to admit, though, there were some ministers when I did contact their offices, who were prepared to listen and assist me. The worst treatment of all was dealt to me by the member for Greatorex who took over three of my portfolios. He denied me my right as an elected member of this House to information and communication with his advisory staff and departmental staff.
Dr Lim: You have to come through the minister, don’t you? The same thing are your rules: come through the minister. Yes, that’s right.
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Member for Greatorex! Order!
Mrs BRAHAM: I seek leave to table this e-mail that says simply:
Leave granted.
Dr Lim: What was wrong with that?
Mrs BRAHAM: What was wrong with that was that the minister refused to speak to me. He still refuses to speak to me. Any requests to speak to him about a matter, he refused to return my calls, his advisory staff were, I think, in fear. They would not answer me. Worst of all, he politicised the public servants, people I have known for years in Alice Springs who then had to say to me, ‘We cannot talk to you; the minister has forbidden it’. I think that is pretty disgusting.
His behaviour continued to be unparliamentary. I will not talk about the personal remark he made about me in the House. He tabled a petition relating to the Salvation Army Hostel for homeless men, but before he did he read through those names on that petition and some of those people were rung up and abused for signing it. Now, I think that is one of the worst examples of abuse of parliamentary privilege that I know. I know those people will not forget his attitude in doing that. Anyone should be able to sign a petition without fear. Anyone should be able to sign a petition and have an opinion, but this member abused that position.
I have to admit his attitude was typical of the attitude of the CLP throughout the campaign. A constituent who allowed me to put a poster up in his front yard of his business was rung not once but five times in an effort to have him take it down. A contractor who had a sticker on his bumper was rung and told to take it off. The CLP candidate had a banner displayed for four weeks. I put mine up and within 24 hours I had a fax saying ‘It is illegal; take it down’. How about that for favouritism? These standover tactics, this bullying, these threats were the reason the CLP lost government. People were basically tired of that attitude, tired of being intimidated, tired of listening to this rhetoric. And the government should keep in mind that they are in government not because the majority voted for Labor but because they voted against the CLP. That was very obvious.
The Independents had, for the first time in Territory elections, a strong influence on the results. There were five seats - and five of you are sitting here in the House; your seats were decided on Independent preferences, so just remember that. There are now two Independents in this parliament. The Independents gained a total of 10% of the total vote but of the 14 seats they contested, they achieved 18% of that vote. That is higher than any minority party that has contested elections in the Northern Territory and it indicates a trend that is occurring in the electorate. The other seven seats that the Independents contested were won by the sitting party, but often with a very reduced majority. There is a lesson there to be learnt for all people in this parliament today: this is the beginning of a challenge to you and Independents will not disappear; they will be the next time around.
I want to thank all those Independents who had a go, particularly those who were in our circle. We all learnt a wise lesson about how to run a campaign and they will certainly be wiser next time around. It is a costly business. You put yourself up for public criticism by standing for election. You put yourself up to public scrutiny. It is not an easy decision to make, particularly as you do not have that support of large, major parties behind you to assist you. Everything you do - your media releases, your statements, your door-knocking - is all done by you and you alone.
May I say election day was quite exciting. I had a wonderful team who were up early and they were certainly most enthusiastic in the handing out. The sour spot of the day for me was the poster put up by the CLP that claimed a vote for Loraine Braham is just a vote for Labor. Now, the Labor Party put me number four on their preferences - thanks very much, guys - and the CLP put me number three, so there were certainly no favours from either party as regards to preferences, but obviously people did not take any notice of the card. They had decided for themselves how to vote and that is why I am here and the CLP candidate is not.
I considered that poster to be offensive and to contravene the act. I believe it was designed to deliberately mislead voters. So I contacted the Electoral Office on that day with an official complaint. The reply came back later that they had obtained a legal opinion; that poster was okay. Now, I do not know. If you think that a statement says ‘A vote for Loraine Braham is just a vote for Labor’ is not trying to mislead voters, I do not know what is. I really believe it was.
Even though at the end of the day I won the seat, and I am certainly grateful to the voters of Braitling for doing that, I still was not convinced in my own mind that that decision was correct so I sought my own legal opinion. They contacted the Electoral Office requesting a copy of the decision. This is the answer we received:
Dr Burns: FOI.
Mrs BRAHAM: Well! FOI says the member for Johnston. Let me just move on and he might wish he had not. Obviously, I was a little bit disappointed with the fact that the Electoral Office would not give me a response, so I wrote to the Chief Minister as the Electoral Office comes under her department. I requested that she release to me that particular document. I will just read to you her reply - and this, remember, is at a time when we are talking about FOI:
So much for FOI. Out the window with it before it has even begun. I am very disappointed with the Chief Minister’s reply. It would clarify for me why a legal person said that that poster did not breach the act. We have seen many instances of posters such as this that, in my opinion, have breached the act. We need to clean up the act if it is going to be so freely interpreted that a poster that will mislead voters is allowed. I say to the Chief Minister: I will be interested to look at the discussion paper that is being tabled today to find out what is exempt and what is not exempt and what you are going to do about the situation such as mine which was a simple request to have an explanation.
However, despite of all this - and I do not want to sound as though I am having sour grapes because we did have fun on election day. It is interesting the way at election booths people from all parties gather together and talk and exchange jokes and what have you. There is an element of fun at polling booths.
I am pleased that all of you supported my nomination for the position of Speaker, despite perhaps of the Leader of the Opposition’s gaffe. I realise that he was having a go at the Leader of Government Business but in doing so made people in this House think he was having another go at me. They really are tired of that negative attitude that keeps coming through. I have brushed up on my standing orders and I hope you all do, too. I will try very hard to be impartial in my rulings and I believe last week that I was impartial across the House.
I want to thank those people from around the Territory who contacted me over this difficult period and showed their support. There were people I do not know, have no idea who they are, who sent me e-mails, little cards, and support. It was quite an amazing reaction and that is why I say the CLP really has a lot of ground to make up. It is that support that prompted me to keep going, because, to be quite honest, it would have been very easy to have walked away. But, people out there believe in honesty, they believe in fairness and a fair go for people, and they believe in justice. These are the principles that made me continue.
I want to thank my wonderful band of helpers who stuffed envelopes, walked miles doing letterbox drops, joined me in TV ads, wrote letters to the editor, on election day worked tirelessly - we were up there at 5am, manned the booths, often came back to help for another session. I want to say thank you to the sandwich maker, the muffin maker, the drinks person, all too many to name but you know who you are and you know how much I appreciate what you did for me.
To Robyn, my right hand lady, she has been with me as my electorate officer since 1994 and she has stuck by me no matter what. I apologise to her that she was given some very poor treatment by her former colleagues in that hard November sittings when we were here together. She gives me great service. She would have to be one of the best PR people that you could get and, most of all, she has shown me loyalty and support when I have been down. In particular, my family who suffered also the stress of the last 12 months but were passionate in their support and have completely changed their voting patterns. I doubt whether they – well, I know they won’t ever vote for the CLP again.
To Graeme, my husband, who has always been there beside me, giving me support and the strength that I need, and his love, no matter what. To Michelle, Peter and Sam for their very up-front comments and their ability to make me laugh. When I told them that they were going to be seated behind Denis Burke at the opening of parliament, their remarks were incredible so we had to move them down here, away. I think it is that fun attitude that they can bring into difficult situations that is able to get you through.
To the voters of Braitling in particular, I want to say thank you. You showed your support for me in a way that was just so good. It was from the heart. The CLP lost 26% of their vote in Braitling. They lost 30% of their vote in Araluen and 10% of the vote in Greatorex. If those margins had been applicable in any other part of the Territory, they would have been decimated. They have a lot of hard work to do to catch up. But, I say to the voters of Braitling, I will continue to work for you, to assist you where I can. As I said to someone the other day it is just like business as usual. Nothing has ever stopped. We still have the door open and people coming in and out.
In my role as Speaker, I have thought long and seriously about it, but I think to be really impartial and to be fair to all of you here, it would be wrong of me to participate in debates and put forward my personal opinion unless it impacted greatly upon my electorate. Although there are times I sit in that seat and want to have a say, feel like making a comment, I’ll bite my tongue because it is you and other people making the decisions. It is up to you to put the argument. Unless there is a tied vote, I won’t vote. I guess a tied vote may happen in exceptional circumstances, but I think it is up to you, the people in this Chamber, to make sure that you vote on all matters.
Mr Deputy Speaker, in closing let me say regardless of the past, we have to forget that, get on with life, get on with the job we have been elected to do, don’t dwell on the past any longer. Let’s all move forward together because that is what is important. It is for the future of Territorians, it is for the future of our children that we are here, that we must make sure that we put in the right measures to make sure the Territory still ticks over. I am quite sure that you and I and all the other members of this parliament will make sure it happens.
Debate adjourned.
Mr VATSKALIS (Lands, Planning and Environment)(by leave): Madam Speaker, during Question Time in answer to a question from the member for Greatorex, I used the term ‘Valuer-General’. Instead, I should have used the term ‘Auditor-General’. My apologies to the House.
Mr REED (Katherine)(by leave): Madam Speaker, I seek leave to make a personal explanation whereby I have been misquoted.
Mr STIRLING: A point of order, Madam Speaker. I am not aware that the rules existing in the former parliament have changed. That is, a personal explanation goes to the Speaker. They were your rules.
Madam SPEAKER: My understanding is that a personal explanation – Clerk, correct me if I am wrong – that you are supposed to put it in writing to me, then we would agree that you would make a comment on that, and that topic only. That is the way to do it, in writing. I have had no written communication from you.
I think I told you this the other day that if anyone wishes to make a personal explanation, they need to come and tell me what it is about.
Mr REED: Don’t worry about it, Madam Speaker.
Mrs AAGAARD (Health, Family and Children’s Services): Madam Speaker, as part of our election platform of building a better Territory, we indicated that health would be one of our key priorities in government and we will be maintaining that commitment. It is very disappointing to become minister for health only to discover the significant underfunding and underservicing of key areas in health and community services evident in so many areas of Territory Health Services and the Territory. Underfunding seems to have been particularly serious in the areas of hospitals, the non-government sector, drug and alcohol services, mental health and community services. The process of discovering this underfunding has been very challenging and indeed alarming. However, today I am not going to go at length into the failures of the former government. I am going to outline the steps that I will be taking to repair and rebuild our health and community sector.
This government will begin by tackling the big health problems that are placing such a strain on our health services today. Key among these problems is the enormous rate of renal disease. Renal disease is extremely costly to treat and is tragic for those suffering and their families. It also has significant cultural and social impacts. For instance, there is the situation whereby many people who come from remote communities to Alice Springs or Darwin for treatment for renal disease will often bring family with them. Some of these people, who have come initially as family support, find themselves with nowhere to live and end up in town camps and can fall into a cycle of alcohol abuse and trouble with the law. This then feeds into the cycle of ill health suffered by our indigenous community.
In Alice Springs, as we have seen recently in the media, many people are living on the river banks in town so as to access renal dialysis treatment. In 1997, the Treasury started ringing the alarm bells about our rising rates of renal disease. At the time, the number of people seeking treatment for renal disease was doubling every four years, and this was placing a huge strain on the Territory Health Services budget. We now know that people suffer from renal disease because of a number of factors, including childhood streptococcus infection, diet, diabetes and high blood pressure. All of these conditions are preventable with early intervention and improved services, including community health services, housing and diet to name but a few. It is a tragedy and a national scandal that over the past 26 years, instead of putting this infrastructure in place, it has been neglected. We are now in a position where we have to deal with an ever increasing number of people suffering chronic disease which was preventable and should have been prevented.
The gap between indigenous and non-indigenous life expectancy increased from 18.7 years in 1981-85 to 22.2 years in 1996-97. Across Australia, the age standardised rate of hospitalisation for indigenous people is 540 per 1000, almost twice as high as the Australian average. In the Territory, the hospital separation rate for indigenous Territorians is 887 people per 1000, compared to just 149 for non-indigenous people. The Territory spends more of its health budget on acute care in our hospitals than any other state or territory. The Australian health expenditure on public hospitals as a proportion of all current health services was 29.2% in 1998-99. In the Territory, this figure sits at a shameful 47%.
In 1997, after Treasury became concerned at how much money was being spent on treating renal disease, staff at Territory Health Services began creating the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy. On 21 April 1999, the former minister for Territory Health Services, the member for Drysdale, made a statement to this House on the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy. As part of that statement he identified the alarming increase in preventable chronic disease in the Northern Territory. He informed the House:
Mr BURKE: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I draw your reference to Standing Order 258 in that it has always been the convention in the past, and it is also in standing orders, that the minister distributes the statement once she commences speaking. That has not occurred, and I ask that they be distributed now.
Madam SPEAKER: The Leader of the Opposition is quite right. We should have the statement delivered to all people in the Chamber.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I am quite happy to take responsibility for that as Leader of Government Business. I should have had it across to the opposition. I will see to it immediately.
Madam SPEAKER: Could you make sure that the Table Office has that copy of the speech before you actually present it. Perhaps the Leader of Government Business could get that done.
Mrs AAGAARD: My apologies, Madam Speaker, I understood that it had been distributed.
In the same speech, the former health minister also went on to outline the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy, which is an excellent document developed by Territory Health Services professionals and is now considered to be the global model for dealing with preventable chronic disease in indigenous communities.
There have been very similar models applied in Queensland and Western Australia, and while it has not been stated that they base their strategies on the Northern Territory Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy, the models they have adopted came after the Territory’s preventable strategy was developed and they bear marked similarities. Canada, too, has expressed interest in the Territory’s Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy and their health services are in the process of implementing a similar strategy there. One of the extraordinary achievements of the people from Territory Health Services who have developed this strategy is that they did so with no development funding from government. This was people who, on top of their pre-existing duties, created a world-class strategy for tackling preventable chronic disease. The former government were justifiably proud of the achievement of their department but, unfortunately, this did not translate into development and implementation funding. This government is committed to ensuring the continuation of funding through the Commonwealth’s Section 100 money, which became available earlier this year.
The Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy developed by THS will be a key plank in our plan to turn around the dire health situation facing indigenous Territorians, and is an integrated approach to dealing with the causes of poor health among our indigenous population. Instead of the traditional scientific reductionist approach to medical science of looking at diseases in isolation, the strategy looks at the conditions creating the poor health outcomes. It also takes into consideration that many of the people fronting up with kidney diseases are suffering from a number of diseases. Conditions such as diabetes and high blood pressure are often associated with renal failure and so cannot be looked at in isolation.
Building from the Preventable Chronic Diseases program, this government will work more closely with indigenous organisations to achieve improved and comprehensive primary health care at a community level. When dealing with indigenous communities, we understand the principle that the process should be driven and owned by the people themselves. This empowered community approach has been historically lacking in many of the dealings between government administrations and indigenous communities throughout our history. We understand that a regime imposed on a community, no matter how well-meaning in intent, will not succeed without the empowerment of that community to make decisions and run programs and hence own the outcomes. The notion that we know what is best for them is a thing of the past. This is not to suggest that we will be abandoning responsibility for providing clinics and other health services, but rather that we will be more focussed on working with communities in partnership to achieve better health outcomes.
I am very pleased to announce to this House that on 28 September, I signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Commonwealth government over their new Primary Health Care Access Program aimed at accessing Commonwealth funding for increasing indigenous people’s access to primary health care services. Through this Memorandum of Understanding, the Territory stands to significantly benefit by the Commonwealth accepting responsibility for funding the shortfall associated with the inaccessibility of its Medicare system to Northern Territory indigenous people. By signing this Memorandum of Understanding, the Territory is poised to receive significantly increased funding for comprehensive primary health care and improved joint planning processes. The only other state or territory jurisdiction to have signed this memorandum is South Australia, which signed up only days before the Territory. By being one of the first jurisdictions to sign the Memorandum of Understanding, we are set to pick up a greatly enhanced share of the program in its first few years.
The Commonwealth has already approved $2.1m per annum in Primary Health Care Access Program funding for five Central Australian zones. The total amount of funding able to be allocated to the Northern Territory health care system in principle is some $60m. The five Central Australian zones to benefit from this injection of funds are Anmatjere, eastern Arrernte-Alyawarra, northern Barkly, Warlpiri, and Luritja/Pintubi. Anmatjere has a population of 1305 people. According to the Central Australian Health Planning Study the current health staffing levels are at only 44% of the levels required for the population. This Memorandum of Understanding for the Primary Health Care Access Program will see funding levels increase significantly. The communities of Tara, Engawala and Laramba have well-organised councils and a strong interest in developing health infrastructure. This funding increase will have a dramatic impact on improving the health services and primary health care in those communities. So, too, in eastern Arrernte-Alyawarra, northern Barkly and Warlpiri which have staffing levels identified as being only 39%, 58% and 53% respectively. This funding injection will enable an increase in the staffing levels required to meet the needs in those communities.
This is a major breakthrough for health services and primary community health care in those areas, and I am hoping that the application of the Primary Funding Health Care Access Program will be expedited to cover many other places of need in regional and remote Northern Territory in the near future. This agreement with the Commonwealth has the potential to really make a difference to our indigenous health outcomes and I hold great expectation that in the near future indigenous Territorians who have contributed so much to our economy, from the pastoral industry to our contemporary cultural exports and tourism industries, will finally have access to health services that the rest of us take for granted.
The importance that we on the side of the House place on health is shared by our federal counterparts. This stands in contrast to those sitting across the Chamber and their federal colleagues. Certainly, it is important to acknowledge the support given by the federal government in their funding allocations for Aboriginal health, and I have already mentioned the MOU in relation to the Primary Health Care Access Program. At the same time, however, it is important to point out that under the present federal government, funding for hospitals has been squeezed to the point where the public hospital system is under threat.
Members will be aware that on 31 July 2000 Labor leaders from all states and territories signed the Medicare Alliance with the federal Labor leader, Kim Beazley. The aim of this alliance is to increase health funding in real terms. The federal Labor Party has now launched a health care policy which, if the Labor Party is elected to government next month, will see a significant increase in federal health funding flowing to the Territory. In fact, I would expect that we would receive at least an additional $6m in Commonwealth funding for our hospitals. This money would be used to bolster our own efforts in important areas such as maternal and child health, palliative care, and mental health services.
Members will be aware of this government’s election commitment to provide radiotherapy services within the Territory, thus enabling patients to be treated in the Territory rather than going interstate. Federal Labor has announced that it would increase funding for radiotherapy services. This funding would complement our commitment to providing a cancer treatment unit at the Royal Darwin Hospital.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I actually have a copy of the statement as circulated and I am finding it difficult to keep up with where the minister is actually speaking. So I obviously have an earlier draft.
Madam SPEAKER: There seems to be a need to correct procedures. Apparently there was a draft statement circulated which must have been changed, from which the minister is now reading. In future, you must make sure that whatever you are delivering is the statement you have given to opposition members so they can prepare for it. You cannot give an amended copy in this House.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): The copy that I have taken out to the Table Office is in fact the final copy. So my apologies if you have the wrong one. There is one coming.
Mrs AAGAARD: My apologies, Madam Speaker.
Another change we will be seeing under this government is recognition of the illicit drug problem in our society and the implementation of real steps to deal with this problem. I will be forming a Drugs Task Force to investigate the issue of drug use in the Northern Territory. This task force will comprise members from a variety of backgrounds and expertise, from service providers in the non-government sector, to those dealing with people with drug addiction, to researchers, through to former drug users themselves. It will work in consultation with the expert staff of Territory Health Services to consider a range of policy and treatment options.
Drawing on this wide range of expertise, I will then use this information to develop a strategy to combat illicit drug use and its harmful effects to both the individuals and our society as a whole. I have been amazed at the lack of resources for dealing with drug addiction in the Northern Territory. On 18 August this head-in-the-sand approach of dealing with drug addiction in the Northern Territory ceased. I will not ignore the research available, like that of Dr Bridie O’Reilly that showed, among other things, a fourfold increase in the use of amphetamines in the Territory over the past three years. It also showed that we had the highest per capita rate of MS Contin use in Australia.
As part of our election platform, we launched our three-point plan to tackle illicit drugs which combined a policing and medical approach to tackling the problem, as well as empowering the courts to look at sentencing for drug offenders, including compulsory treatment. We pledged to provide treatment and rehabilitation services in Alice Springs and Darwin in a bid to reduce the amount of intravenous drug use in the community. Our plan also includes the provision of effective services for treatment and rehabilitation in Darwin and Alice Springs, to reduce the amount of intravenous drug use in the community. It also includes the implementation of a properly resourced drug prevention strategy including education and family support services, an education campaign directed at our schools, and the utilisation of cinema and television advertising.
Whilst this three-point plan stands as the basis of our drug strategy, the Drug Task Force I will be introducing will be given a wide scope to explore new techniques and processes for tackling our drug problem. We will also be accessing available Commonwealth money so as to be in an informed position when it comes to understanding the scope and type of drug abuse going on in the Territory.
Earlier this year, the former government banned employees of the Northern Territory Public Service from talking to the National Drug and Substance Abuse Inquiry. The National Drug and Substance Abuse Inquiry was a politically bipartisan House of Representatives Committee inquiry which was trying to gain an understanding of type and scope of the drugs issues from around Australia. The Northern Territory was the only jurisdiction in Australia not to cooperate with the inquiry. Luckily, for those who have their houses broken into by drug addicts seeking to satisfy their habits or those affected by drug addiction and misuse in the Northern Territory, we will be taking a vastly different approach.
I will now talk about our plans for hospitals in the Northern Territory. In opposition, we pledged that we would not privatise any of our five public hospitals. We stand by that pledge. We aim to make Royal Darwin Hospital a comprehensive care centre that will deliver the full range of services required by Territorians and which will be a model for all tropical health facilities. Our regional hospitals will not be neglected in achieving this aim. Our regional hospitals will be developed in line with community needs and expectations to cater for both existing need and allowing for growth and expansion in those communities.
In achieving this aim we will implement better medium to long term planning practices for our hospitals’ development rather than the ad hoc funding system we have seen in the past whereby capital works funding is starved over a period of years to be pulled out in an election year. For example, in 1997-98, the former Territory government spent only 1.8% of its capital expenditure on health facilities compared to an all state average of 10.4%. This dropped to 1.7% in 1998-99 compared to an all state average of 14.8%. This is despite the relatively high level of overall capital works spending in the Territory.
There has been an ongoing history of budget underfunding of our hospitals. Over the five year period 1995-96 to 1999-2000, the Royal Darwin Hospital actual expenditure averaged 7.7% per annum more than was budgeted for. For the other Territory hospitals, the result was 6.4% per annum more than was budgeted. This places extreme pressure on the management of our hospitals and on the staff working within them as they strive to meet the budget parameters with negative impacts on staff morale and retention rates.
In February 2000, the Australian Medical Association stated that funding for public hospitals was increasing at barely 4% per annum. They estimated that an annual increase of 8% was required to provide the expected level of care and services. That is the average increase that has actually occurred for Territory hospitals as extra funding was provided towards the end of each financial year to meet costs.
This government is committed to providing best practice medical care in our hospital system in modern and well-maintained hospitals. That means that meeting the capital needs of our hospitals must be on an ongoing and systematic basis, not on an ad hoc one. Territory Health Services is currently implementing a major project in our hospital system to improve efficiency to get money back to the bedside. The department is currently identifying areas of duplication and inefficiency so as to be able to redirect these funds to where they are most needed.
In line with our election commitments, this government will continue with the redevelopment of Royal Darwin and Alice Springs Hospitals currently underway. We will also ensure that our hospitals are able to rely on dedicated funds from the annual capital works program each and every year. Not only will this provide hospitals with greater certainty, it will also provide greater stability to the Territory construction sector. With annual spending of around $200m to $250m on capital works in the Territory budget, it is clearly achievable to dedicate a proportion of this over the next five years to ensure the capital needs of hospitals, as identified by the Health Developments Report, are substantially addressed.
In order to ensure the costings contained in the HDI report are still relevant, this government will produce a comprehensive and funded hospital upgrade plan to meet the projected needs of Territorians. This will be conducted in conjunction with a health equipment audit in our hospitals to identify obsolete and outdated medical and clinical equipment and embark on an immediate upgrade program prioritised to improve clinical outcomes and hospital efficiencies. In addition, I will strongly argue for additional funding from the Commonwealth to meet the higher costs of hospital care in the Territory given the morbidity profiles of our indigenous population. I will also strongly argue to see included in the next Australian Health Care Agreement, due to commence in 2003, specific clauses and funding to address the complex acute morbidity of indigenous Territorians entering our hospitals.
This government will improve the availability and appropriate use of modern communications technology to improve the information available to health workers on patients, access to information by patients themselves and access to expert and specialist advice. I will also be looking at ways of improving access to health information through a Health Direct line and Internet service similar to systems which have been introduced in other jurisdictions which have assisted in a significant reduction in visits to Accident and Emergency departments in the less severe triage categories. We will improve the ability of the health system to train, recruit and hold medical and specialist medical staff, nurses and health workers.
This government believes that consumers of health care have a right to information and choice about the services and treatments available to them, and a right to information about the success of medical interventions and the performance of all health care providers in hospitals and medical practices. This assists individuals to take more responsibility for their own health through better information and more active involvement in decision making about their health care. In conjunction with a federal Labor government, we will work constructively towards the introduction of an electronic health record. Labor will cooperate with the Commonwealth to ensure national standards are accommodated.
Madam Speaker, I have used this opportunity to outline some of our vision for Territory Health Services in our hospital system. After becoming minister, despite the shortfalls and government neglect that many of our health services suffer, I was delighted to discover that we have a very strong foundation upon which to build Territory Health Services into a first class service. That strong foundation is the dedicated team of people at Territory Health Services who have developed enormous expertise on health and community services in the Northern Territory over many years. I look forward to working closely with my department and with the non-government sector to build a great Territory health system.
Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the statement.
Mr DUNHAM (Drysdale): Madam Speaker, I suppose I should start by saying that I am very pleased that the statement has been presented in such a way because essentially what it is is a plagiarised patchwork quilt from a variety of policies that were well and truly in place before this member even considered entering politics. There is a very long history to this and the very strong foundations that have been built, have been built as a very good legacy which has been left to this government.
I notice that it was sprinkled with a few ‘it’s terrible that the neglect has been in place for so long, over so many years’ and that type of rhetoric. I assume what has happened is a variety of areas in the department have sent up statements that have been thrown together into one statement. Somebody has done an edit on them and said, ‘You have to put some nasty things about the previous government and some good things about the potential for an incoming Labor federal government and there you have a speech’. Well, you don’t. I think the foundation document really should have been Labor’s policy. If you walk through this document, which it is my intention to do now, you will see that with a brief critique in some cases it actually argues against itself, and in many cases, the minister is arguing from a point of acceptance of briefing rather than looking to putting her own imprimatur and standards on this and that this is a potential problem for those opposite. If they want to be in autopilot mode, they should be a bit careful about making sure the things that are in their political speak and their platforms and their elections actually turn into action and documents.
Just a quick word on process. I did speak personally to the minister last night who told me I would have this by e-mail at 8 o’clock last night. I didn’t, in fact, have it this morning so it was e-mailed to a variety of people not including myself. I did get a copy this morning and as the Parliamentary Record will now show, those of us on this side did not actually get a copy of this statement until half way through, and in any event the one we had was an abridged one. The bit that was put in was mostly political rhetoric, I see, with the additional of the radiotherapy services which is a $15m promise and which is something I would like to touch on as we go through this.
I will finish with a couple of things, given that I have a reasonable amount of time. First is some advice and the second is some questions, seeing as how the matter of the federal election has been intruded into this statement, that the minister might like to answer in her rejoinder closing debate. I have several questions here that have come out of the Labor policy of yesterday - it was very recent if not yesterday. I am sure that given that they are very strong about their relationship, not only with the Labor government but also very enthusiastic about the potential for Kim Beazley to be Prime Minister, that they will have answers for these questions.
If we start walking through the statement that the members now have, we probably should look at the first page. ‘I am not going to go to any length about the failures of the former government,’ and then continually spatter the speech with them, but let’s talk about the key issues in the paper.
There is an allegation when we get straight into renal failure that people come into town, have nowhere to live and end up in town camps. Well, my recollection is that the raison d’tre of many of these town camps is for visitors coming from remote communities who are in town for a time limited period who would prefer to live in a milieu that is more comfortable for them than the mainstream town. It is for that reason that there are some 19 of these enclaves in Alice Springs alone, and they are the formal ones. The informal ones would probably total up to another five or six. So, to denigrate town camps as a place where people from bush come in and live while they are supporting the unfortunate member who is in end stage renal failure shows a lack of understanding of town camps. I have some problems with how town camps are structured and with how they are managed. But essentially, town camps provide an accommodation option for Aboriginal people coming into urban settings and for them to be put in a mode here of ‘end up in town camps and fall into the cycle of alcohol abuse and trouble with the law,’ possibly is the sort of thing that even organisations like Tangentyere and Aboriginal Development Foundation might have some difficulty with that sort of aspersion.
The allegation - and I did see it in the media too, because I think it was sparked by a letter from an Aboriginal organisation to some Senate inquiry – ‘in Alice Springs we have recently seen many people living on the riverbank in town so as to access renal dialysis treatments’. I would ask the minister if she could tell me the number of people - ‘many’ I assume being several or more – who are living on the riverbanks in town and accessing renal dialysis treatments. I did investigate it myself as minister, and found the allegation to be untrue. There are a couple of options here: firstly, it is true and I was misinformed; second is it is untrue and the minister in her rejoinder can retract it; and third, perhaps since I left the job, which is now a couple of months ago and her coming in, this has now become a phenomena. I would like to know which of the three it is.
The statement then goes on to talk about that in 1997 the Treasury started ringing alarm bells about our rising rates of renal disease. This is just a nonsense and it is my hope that Treasury have not written this statement or had any input into it and I would be very surprised if people in Territory Health Services are informing the minister that it was Treasury that discovered this problem with renal disease. That they knew about it, did not know about it until some boffin in the Treasurer’s department said, ‘Look, you have a really big problem with renal disease’.
Mr Kiely interjecting.
Mr DUNHAM: You will have an opportunity to speak, my friend. In your opportunity to speak perhaps this is the issue you could address. It is obviously something that has sparked your interest and if you want to interject about the Territory Health Services only understanding about renal disease in 1997, I think you are being a bit critical of your former colleagues in a way that is untrue.
That is not true and it is not true on the basis that I worked for a variety of ministers in CLP governments since about 1988 and it is something that is well known to us. The cost of renal failure and the social and other issues are well known to us. There are some of us in this House who knew the former member for Arafura very well and I am one of them. We know the tragedy of end stage renal failure with that particular gentleman and we know the issues relating to his kidney transplant. I think it is a bit foolish for a minister to come in here and tell a parliament that sat with that particular member that it was something we did not know about until 1997 when we were told by Treasury officials. Indeed, if one goes to the Public Accounts Committee report which is dated 1996 - and I think you may have even been on the committee, Madam Speaker, I can’t recall - but that certainly predates that and it, too, is knowledgeable about this phenomena.
Then we get into the Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy; this is a great strategy. All of the conditions prevented with end stage renal failure blah, blah, blah, and I quote from the minister’s statement:
It is a tragedy and a national scandal that over the past 26 years instead of putting this infrastructure in place
it has been neglected.
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. That particular sentence is wrong on a couple of accounts. In the first place those of us who have been in the Northern Territory since self-government will recall it happened in 1978 and if you are any good at maths that gets you to 23 years. Also, those of you who were here after that would recall that there were some things the Commonwealth took some time to hand over and one of them was health. If you go back to that time - and here is a piece of ministerial officer advice for the minister - talk to people who span that period. Talk to Dr Hargraves, talk to Dr Alan Walker, talk to some of these people whose practice spanned that 20 years and you would be stunned at how much has happened. Go back 20 years and look at the practice of health in this place. As a young child I grew up in Katherine. I can remember having a toothache and having to come to Darwin to go to the dentist. I suppose I am an old person, I am in my 40s, but if you go back 40 years you will see that infrastructure was much, much more deficient than what we had 20 years ago. Go back to 60 years or 80 years to Dr Clyde Fenton and you will see that the growth in this place in our human resource, our technology, our physical infrastructure, our hospitals has been absolutely remarkable. It has been astonishing.
When the minister talks about ‘it was not really the government, it was others’, I am quite happy to acknowledge that, quite happy to acknowledge that. We have had some really good people in our health sector. We have had some remarkable advocates who have been wage and salary earners in the main, who have done work above and beyond the call of duty. Certainly, the physical structure of the Katherine Hospital, which was originally built on the current site by Dr Clyde Fenton back in 1935 I think, and the modification certainly with paediatric and the Jack Roney Wing came with great input from Dr Short and Dr Scattini, two local GPs who were on the hospital board and were practitioners in the hospital, I am quite happy to give those accolades. It is not my intention to say all this stuff happened because of the government, but neither is it true to say all this stuff happened in spite of the government or despite the government, because that is just foolish.
If you look at the Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy which is this portion of the speech, we talk about that which was preventable and which should have been prevented. The question for the minister, and this will plague her through her entire time, is should it be prevented by the government? Because the issue with preventable chronic diseases is that it is incumbent on all of us. On the last occasion I spoke about this, I spoke about the member for Arnhem - I was being pilloried for having ‘blood on my hands’ if I recall at the time - and I said that there is something we all could do. For instance, we could register to donate our organs, that is something we could do for people with end stage renal failure. The Aboriginal leaders and people of the ilk of the member for Arnhem could lose weight, because he is a leader among his people and his physical condition is something that he could prevent. Myself, also, if I am a leader among Aboriginal people. The point at that time was that it was seen as an unfair call on him, it was out of bounds, it was really naughty and then lo! and behold, he went to see his doctor who said, ‘Jack, you should lose weight, mate. That is half your problem’.
When we talk about preventable chronic disease …
Ms LAWRIE: A point of order, Madam Speaker. The member for Drysdale was referring to another member by his name.
Madam SPEAKER: He does know better than that, don’t you?
Mr DUNHAM: Madam Speaker, I was being familiar with the member for Arnhem …
Madam SPEAKER: I know, but he still has a position in this House.
Mr DUNHAM: Okay, and I quoted ‘Blank, you could lose a bit of beef’.
Going on to this particular strategy, it is something that involves us all. If the government is saying in this statement that preventable chronic disease is something which should have been prevented and it is our call, they do not understand what the strategy is, and they certainly do not understand some of the rhetoric that we get into later about this has to involve local people, and they have to own the system. This is page 7 of the minister’s statement: ‘When dealing with Aboriginal communities we understand the principle that the process should be driven and owned by the people themselves’. Yes, and the government has a big role to play – true. It has a big role to play as a funder, as an educator, as a researcher but, to drive the preventable chronic diseases …
Dr Burns: You never implemented it.
Mr DUNHAM: … and a commentator, Madam Speaker, and I hope some of the commentary will come later on.
We talk about Territory heath expenditure as sitting at a shameful 47%. This is quite a strange speech because it goes from one side of saying you underfunded them, ah, but you found the money, and other states are funding it at this level, and you are funding at a shameful greater level. Well, this is a bit of a strange line to follow. We often get criticised for spending too much in health, the health budget has blown out, you gave them more money at the end of the year, and then we are told we are being frugal and tight-fisted. I suggest you have to work out what it is you are attacking us for. I stand entirely by the quotes, by the way, the quotes that we talked about. The Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy was debated in this parliament. It has remarkable adherence from practitioners and researchers, and others in the Territory Health Services.
It has a good heritage that has been discussed over a long period of time and, again, if you go to most practitioners, it was something they did innately. A lot of clinicians in communities understood innately the Preventative Chronic Diseases Strategy. What was done was it was put into a core document and it happened about the time that Peter Plummer took over as the steward of the department. I do not attribute the strategy to him but what I will say is that at about that time, we distilled our thinking into such a way that this came out as a priority strategy that we would implement and adhere to.
Its origins go way back past that, and again I will call up the PAC report that was done circa 1996. There is a diagram in there that empirically demonstrates the Preventative Chronic Diseases Strategy and causes for the high rates of hospitalisation and acute care for Aboriginal people.
Dr Burns: So the PAC did it?
Mr DUNHAM: This is a difficult concept to get through to them. What I am trying to demonstrate is this is something that was known by many people. It has many authors, that it was a very powerful and innate strategy within the Territory Health Service, that it was understood widely by many practitioners and put into informal practice by them. GAMUT was one of the programs, GAIMS was another program, and while I am not going to stand in this parliament and claim authorship and sponsorship of it, neither will I say that it was something that happened totally devoid of any government involvement.
Then we have this terrible allegation that the people, the extraordinary people from Territory Health, did it on top of their pre-existing duties and created a world class program. Well, let’s get this straight: what we said is this is an innate part of all our jobs, and it is a priority task for government, and it is a task that should be incumbent on all of us, and it should already be embedded in your duties. So, in the first call we had was do that audit, make sure it is embedded in your duties. Make sure if you are the clinic sister that some of this is part of your job. Make sure that when you are looking to prepare your estimates that you put it in.
That is a pretty good start, because what happened is we had a very generous Commonwealth government come to power that was quite happy to look to these as priority items, unlike their Labor predecessors who neglected this place, starved this place and were entirely ignorant about what happened up here. So, that was a pretty good strategy. The Commonwealth Section 100 money is enormous money, when we looked at approaching the Commonwealth - and again you can go back to the PAC report. In that report it said that our underfunding through MBS, Medical Benefits Schedule, and PBS amounted to something like $50m. That was a really potent document to go and slam on the desks of federal ministers. We were very lucky because we had federal minister Dr Michael Wooldridge. Now, Dr Michael Wooldridge came here over a dozen times as the shadow Aboriginal Affairs minister, and he came here often as the Health minister. I go back long enough to have seen his predecessor, Dr Carmen Lawrence, and Mr Richardson and Mr Howe, and I will make a little commentary on all of them. I do not think Brian Howe ever came here as health minister. I don’t think he ever set foot in this place. He was very dismissive of anything to do with private health, and he was entirely focused on the hospital system.
We believed that there had been a bit of a light when head kicker, Richo, came to power. We got on pretty well with him at conferences, and he did make a trip here, and it should be put on the Parliamentary Record - Minister Richardson did come to this place. I was working for the then health minister, Mike Reed, in Katherine, and Mr Richardson came to Katherine. He spent two days there and only had a half an hour at a cocktail welcome, the community thing, to speak to the Territory health minister. He did go and visit some town camps, and he was so disgusted when he visited an illegal town camp and found there was not a tap there, that he organised with Mayor Jim Forscutt to have a tap put on. I am not sure if the tap is still there, but I think it is one of those Labor monuments that should be put into their history, because that was the sole savvy of this bloke’s skill. He obviously knew nothing about water borne diseases, he knew nothing about the difficulties in having people living it tough in illegal camps as opposed to the already provided town camps.
Carmen Lawrence: we were pretty keen to see her there too because she had been a state health minister and we thought, ‘Ah! somebody who is not a captive of the bureaucrats in Canberra. This will be good. We will be able to talk to this lady’, and we tried and tried and tried to track her down. In fact, we finally caught her in her electorate office in Fremantle, and I think it was by some trick of, again, then health minister Reed, to actually catch her. We had pretty good relationships with other health ministers, including Labor health ministers. I can remember talking to the Queensland health minister and saying, ‘Look, how do you how do you actually get to talk to her?’. He said, ‘Look, you can’t, she is hiding. She has total siege mentality, doesn’t want the health portfolio, is hiding until she can get something big like being the Prime Minister of Australia.’
So, when people want to go back in history, they should remember that you cannot just dismiss the actions of government. If you dismiss the actions of government – if you look at…
Members interjecting.
Mr DUNHAM: Madam Speaker, if there are many more contributors to this, they should do so one at a time, because what happens is I will start speaker louder and louder and it becomes difficult for people to actually follow the tape.
Where we were was talking about some of the things that happen by government - by government - and while I will say there are other players involved, you cannot say that the inroads in health have happened totally devoid of government, and some of the calls in this particular document even say despite government.
I can remember working for a health minister and he got a call from - and I have recounted this in the parliament and I will do so again - a paediatrician late at night who had a very ill child he was treating and he talked to him about a thing called HiB, Haemophillis influenza type B. He talked about how this disease could be eradicated, there was going to be a new capacity for it to be eradicated with inoculation on the market, and the matter was being debated in an economic way about the cost of this. That health minister was instrumental in eradicating the disease, the highest incidence in the world of which was around Alice Springs among Aboriginal people. So, sometimes it does not hurt to involve government because, essentially, you need resources and resources come out of things like budgets. Are they going to come out of the mini-budget we are going to do next week? That is why it is important to interrogate these budgets because we need to know if this stuff is not rhetoric that it is going to be in the budget.
We need to know that in November, when we turn up and we read papers saying, ‘We think drug strategies are really important, we are going to give them money and chronic diseases’, we want to see the cash. Show me the money. What we want to see in November is the capacity for us to interrogate the words that are coming out of the mouths of those opposite and see whether we are still on election mode, are we still talking rhetoric, or whether we are getting to cut to the chase and getting to the fact that it is going to actually turn into programs and money.
The business about community involvement - yep, I agree with that. Not only is it in many statements to this House, not only is it in how the department, Territory Health Services, does business, it is in the former Chief Minister’s Foundations for Our Future statement. It is not something, as I said, where somebody has hit a keyboard and cobbled together some well-sounding words. When we get to the five Central Australia zones, this is big money - $2.1m from the Primary Health Care Access Program for five Central Australia zones. That sort of money can make some big inroads, it can buy some really good human resources. The minister went on to talk about eastern Arrernte-Alyawarra, northern Barkly, Warlpiri, and - what is Luitju/Pintubi in here, unless the spelling has changed, is Luritja/Pintubi.
She also talks about the communities: ‘… Tara, Engawala and Laramba have well-organised councils and a strong interest in developing health infrastructure’. My question for her is: ‘Says who? Says who?’ Because what the minister for health has to do is go to these places. In fact, I have been there. I think it is incumbent on her when she starts to talk about Aboriginal health, she starts to talk about community involvement, communication, consultation, all that stuff, you actually have to go there. You have to get into a light plane, fly out in the storms, land on the dirt strip, walk through the mud, and go and talk to the well-organised council at Tara. Until you do that, you are going to be held captive in this building.
The fine words that are in here may be true, they may not. We may have a lot of people with end stage renal failure receiving dialysis, living in the bed of the Todd River. The communities of Tara, Engawala and Laramba may well have well-organised councils, they may be absolutely ecstatic about developing health infrastructure. Go and have a look, see what it is about. And when you do put that funding increase in, make sure that you audit it. That is why we had the Health Gains Unit which is not mentioned in the speech at all. But the Health Gains Unit is where we are going. We have to make sure that when we put money into a place, we can measure that there is a direct nexus between the cash going in and better health outcomes. Unless you can, all you are doing is using the money to pay lip service to rhetoric.
Many on this side of the House are interested in your drugs policies. We have read several of them, and we have heard your rhetoric. We have also heard, for instance, the interjections from people like the new member for Karama, who was saying, ‘Shame, you have nothing’. I think there are a couple of issues. One quote: ‘I have been amazed by the lack of resources for dealing with drug addiction in the Northern Territory’. Have you been to the AIDS Council yet? Have you been to Banyan House yet? Have you been to the sobering-up shelter yet? Have you been to detox yet? Have you been to a ACOCA yet? Have you been to Congress yet? Have you been to any of the recipients of the federal government’s Tough on Drugs money? Have you been to Danila Dilba and looked at the program they put in with the Commonwealth’s money?
When you have done that, you can talk about the lack or otherwise of resources. But you must go there. Do not rely on a report from somebody who has a vested interest saying, ‘Minister, we do not have much money and we need more or people are going to die’, because I tell you, you are going to hear that every day. Every day, everybody will tell you they need more money – everybody! So it does not matter which sector you are dealing with in health, whether you are talking to researchers, or practitioners in the acute setting, or to people in the field or the non-government sector, they are all going to tell you they need more money. I do not think that is a good thing to parrot that back and say there is no money. You actually have to go and have a look and benchmark that.
When you talk about the head-in-the-sand approach dealing with drug addiction, I dispute that entirely. Not only …
Dr Burns: It is minuscule. That is what you said.
Mr DUNHAM: You may say it is minuscule. I will pick that up for the Parliamentary Record. Dr Burns, the member for …
Dr Burns: No, I did not say it was minuscule. Your ex-Police Minister said that, and your ex-Chief Minister.
Mr DUNHAM: No, it is on the record. You said it was minuscule.
Dr Burns: Yes, it is on the record, that is what they said.
Madam SPEAKER: Order!
Mr DUNHAM: Madam Speaker, it is really important we pick this rhetoric up. I disagree with him. I think he is entirely wrong. The member for Johnston believes the drug problem is minuscule. I disagree with him. I think it is one of those things where it has been used as a political plaything, and it has never ever been recognised by the previous government as minuscule. Indeed, we have …
Mr Henderson: Read the Hansard.
Mr DUNHAM: Oh, it is in Hansard? He said it is minuscule, and that is why I am glad I picked that up. I am interested to know whether, given the rhetoric about people have to own the problem and be part of it etcetera, if you are an Aboriginal person in the bush, whether the program of having compulsory treatment will work, I would like to see a little more about that. I think there are some difficult problems with compulsory treatment.
I like the idea about education campaign directed to our schools and utilisation of cinema and TV advertising. I need an assurance that DARE will continue. I want to hear that out of the words out of the government. DARE is a great program and I want to hear that it will continue. I want to hear that Life Education will continue.
The other thing that is also not true in the statement and should be pointed out: ‘The Territory is the only jurisdiction in Australia not to cooperate with the inquiry’. That is untrue. There is a substantial submission that was put in, a substantial submission. I guarantee that if you look at the other states’ submissions, they will pale into insignificance against ours. Not only did we cooperate with the House of Representatives committee of inquiry, but I gave evidence. So, do I know it is a lie? Yes, I know it is a lie, because I actually swore, I gave evidence to the committee. Their problems with Hansard was such that it is not all fully recorded, but it is there for those who want to check whether that is, in fact, the truth or not.
Time precludes me from going further on this, but we will have other speakers from this side, and hopefully, some more opportunities to debate the important issue of health, given that it has been said – and the putative Prime Minister, Mr Beazley said it again – that the health, education, jobs are the important things. You cannot say it is important and then not talk about it, not answer letters and not do it. So, let us see the bona fides here.
The long diatribe about hospital funding – I think the new minister has been seduced by acute sector with the bells, whistles, lights, and hi-tech gear. The whole idea that we have to have more money go to the bedside, I dispute. We have to get more money to the community. It must go to preventative programs. It must go into programs that prevent rather than treat. The long diatribe that is in there about the good hospital system – which I agree with is good – should be moderated in terms of your priorities. Your priorities must be community-based, prevention-based programs that look to keep people out of hospital, not in hospital and being treated.
I will leave it there, Madam Speaker, only by virtue of the fact that I have run out of time. But I will be seeking to put on the record some questions about the federal government’s Medicare Alliance, and I would ask the minister to make some calls and provide answers to that before she sits down.
Dr BURNS (Johnston): Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to respond to the minister’s statement. As outlined in my maiden speech, I have a long-standing interest in supporting improvements in the health and wellbeing of Territorians. I am proud to affirm all elements of the minister’s statement on health. That statement reaffirms, once again, the priority that this government – this Labor government – gives to improving the health and welfare of Territorians. It is in stark contrast to the scandalous legacy of neglect, incompetence and ill health, left to the people of the Northern Territory by the previous CLP government. I will detail it.
Let me illustrate what that terrible legacy of – I call it the ‘Deadly Territory’. This is what they left us. It is sad state of NT health bequeathed from the CLP government. The release of this publication here, which is the Territory Health Services publication, Mortality in the Northern Territory, 1979-1997, occurred early in 2000 without fanfare or publicity. That was in stark contrast to the publication of the previous publication, which was Morbidity and Mortality in the Northern Territory, 1979-1991. I can well remember Ray Norman, who was the Chief Executive Officer of Territory Health Services at that stage, releasing that document and going through it and publicly showing what the figures meant. This publication arrived anonymously, and it was not until I went through the tables and what was contained in here that I understood why it had never been released publicly and why it had probably been sat on in the minister’s office for quite some time.
From the former CLP government’s perspective, the reason for the lack of publicity surrounding this publication here is understandable, because it is a damning indictment on the way in which health of Northern Territorians, both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, has deteriorated over the past 18 years. Tragically, in terms of Aboriginal health, this publication does not report any dramatic improvement. In most major disease categories such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes and renal disease, injury and poisoning, there are continuing and unacceptably high death rates. Many of these rates are between twice and 10 times the Australian rate. In many other disease categories, there were further increases in Aboriginal death rates. Without wanting to diminish the appalling state of NT Aboriginal health and the need to effectively address this unacceptable situation, this publication here contains dramatic and alarming revelations relating to the health of the non-Aboriginal population in the Northern Territory. I am going to detail it now.
NT non-Aboriginal death rates in the 1991-95 period are far greater than the Australian population in crucial disease categories such as lung cancer; 30% higher for non-Aboriginal men and almost double for non-Aboriginal women when you compare it to the Australian rate. Diabetes: 40% higher for non-Aboriginal men when compared to the non-Aboriginal Australian rate. Respiratory disease: 30% higher for non-Aboriginal men and 60% higher for non-Aboriginal women. Injury: 50% higher for non-Aboriginal men and 30% higher for non-Aboriginal women. Infectious disease: over twice the rate for non-Aboriginal men compared to the Australian rate. So those are the death rates. In summary, they are much higher in major disease categories for non-Aboriginal Territorians than compared to the Australian rate.
There are also trends in this document. There has been a consistent increase in Northern Territory non-Aboriginal death rates in a whole range of major disease categories since 1979 when compared to the Australian population. For example, diabetes: in the 1981-85 period, the NT non-Aboriginal male death rate from diabetes was 70% lower than the Australian male rate. However, in 1991-95, it was 40% higher than the Australian male death rate, so it has gone from 70% lower to 40% higher. Although the absolute numbers are relatively small, this represents a relative increase of over 100% even when increases in the Australian male death rate have been accounted for in relation to diabetes.
Respiratory disease: in the 1981-1985 period the NT non-Aboriginal female death rate for respiratory disease was 20% higher than the Australian female rate. In 1991-95, it was 60% higher than the Australian female death rate.
Cardiovascular disease: in the 1986-90 period to the 1991-95 period the NT non-Aboriginal male death rate increased by 15% and also recorded a 30% increase relative to the Australian male death rate which was declining during that period. Optimistically, it could be said that any previous decline in the NT non-Aboriginal death rate between 1981-90 for cardiovascular disease has stalled against the background of a sharp decline nationally.
So we are talking about non-Aboriginal Territorians and the appalling state of health, figures from your own report over a long period, that is an indictment against the mismanagement and the neglect of your government over a very long period. Although the overall death rates for non-Aboriginal males and non-Aboriginal females in the Northern Territory are 6% and 13% lower than the corresponding death rates in 1996-97, these overall lower death rate figures for the non-Aboriginal population tend to hide the underlying and alarming situation in many of the top ranked major disease categories as outlined above.
In summary, yes, our non-Aboriginal death rates when you take them in toto are less than the Australian rate, but there are many reasons for that and it is actually hiding some of these factors that I have mentioned before, so I wouldn’t be taking comfort from that. Notwithstanding this effect, excess non-Aboriginal death rates in most of the other top ranked major disease categories are cause for great concern. This state of affairs is a damning indictment of the way the CLP allowed the Northern Territory to become ‘Deadly Territory’ for Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people alike.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker! The member claimed that he was quoting from a document, and I would just like to know whether the quote has ended because I can’t recall those words in that document.
Dr BURNS: This is my interpretation of the tables that are in that document, because there is very little commentary there. I will stand by my interpretation of them. I will stand by it.
They have failed to effectively address Aboriginal health issues and they have also neglected to safeguard the health of other Territorians. Now there has been a change in government, we are committed to rein in this excessive mortality. Labor pledges to effectively address chronic disease health issues confronting Territorians by providing leadership through a professional, energetic and committed approach outlined by our health minister. We commend the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy, however unlike the CLP we will actually implement it. Now …
Mr Dunham: With Commonwealth money. Where do you think you will get it from, you goose?
Madam SPEAKER: Order! Member for Drysdale.
Dr BURNS: Now there was some mention about who should take credit for the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy. Not once did I hear the name of Professor John Mathews mentioned. Not once did I hear the name of Dr Wendy Hoy or Dr Tarun Weeramanthri who were all key players in the development of the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy. The Kidney Disease Research Project, which grew out of Dr Hoy’s work, is actually an example of how, with funding from the private sector and with funding from the non-government sector and with little help from the government, there can be very positive outcomes obtained in a very short time.
I was a member of the Preventable Chronic Diseases Committee that used to meet at Health House over about a year or 18 month period and my opinion was it just flapped around, it didn’t really have a clear direction from government. We were not sure whether we were reporting to the health minister or the CEO of Health and there was just a lack of leadership, and that is going to contrast with what this government is going to do.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Johnston, would you please talk to me.
Dr BURNS: Yes, Madam Speaker. I will, however, commend the former government for funding cardiac rehab, although that in itself is still awaiting implementation, but that was a positive step.
Mr Baldwin: Well, get on with it, you mob.
Dr Lim: You’re in government now. Do something about it.
Madam SPEAKER: Order!
Dr BURNS: Well, we will. We are. Now, onto illicit drugs. Apart from maintaining that the illicit drug problem in Darwin was minuscule – that’s the former government – even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the former government completely ignored …
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker. It cannot be demonstrated that the former government said that the problem was minuscule and I believe that he is defaming government in such a way he should do it by way of substantive motion.
Madam SPEAKER: I don’t think there is a point of order there. The member for Johnston, please remember you are talking to me.
Dr BURNS: However, the former government, I believe, completely ignored the value of drug treatment and rehabilitation to redress this issue. I quote the former police minister when talking to Fred McCue on 17 January this year:
However, I know that what is euphemistically called the Pain Clinic, where there was some methadone available for those with a drug problem, albeit for a very short period, was underfunded, understaffed, there was no specialist doctor, neither was there a psychologist there to assess patients. It was a mess. I was on the Schedule 8 committee for a period of six years and I know what the former government was not doing in the area of illicit drugs.
The truth of the matter is that the former CLP government allowed the prescription of morphine to spiral out of control in the Territory over many years, and for ever increasing amounts of this morphine to be diverted to addicts. The lack of an effective CLP drug policy spawned large scale illicit narcotic use, mainly morphine prescribed at six times the average of southern states and diverted to drug addicts. My own estimates, based on Health Insurance Commission figures, put the illicit morphine trade in Darwin between about 1998 and 1999 and possibly into 2000 at $10m per year street value of the amount of morphine that was diverted. So here we go. This is morphine that is primarily paid for by the taxpayer being diverted onto the streets of Darwin.
Mr Dunham: Illegally provided by doctors. Is that your allegation? Doctors illegally provided 10 million bucks of…
Dr BURNS: This all occurred under your stewardship. This all occurred at taxpayers expense through the Commonwealth Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, and because it was through the PBS, I once again estimated that there was a cost to the Australian taxpayer of somewhere between $300 000 and $400 000 per year. This was a problem ignored by the CLP government until the Health Insurance Commission, a Commonwealth body, intervened in 1999. Everyone knew about it. However, it is not a problem that will be ignored by this government, and our health minister has outlined how we will effectively address this problem.
Mr Dunham: No, she hasn’t.
Dr BURNS: Yes, she has.
Madam Speaker, returning to the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy, we will effectively use funding under the Primary Health Care Access Program, or PHCAP, to support primary health care on Aboriginal communities. This will reduce the number of Aboriginal people currently being admitted to Territory hospitals because of inadequate primary health care at the community level.
Our health minister has also affirmed our commitment to providing best practice and adequate infrastructure in our hospitals. I applaud her commitment to produce a comprehensive and funded hospital upgrade plan. You will find out about the dollars.
Madam Speaker, in summary, I heartily endorse the statement made by our minister for health. It clearly sets out the strategies by which this government proposes to effectively improve the health and wellbeing of Territorians, and there will be no more ‘Deadly Territory’ for us.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker. I would ask, under Standing Order 256, that the member table the document he quoted from, because there is some confusion about his quote ends and starts.
Madam SPEAKER: Could you table the document? Will you table the document?
Mr DUNHAM: He must.
Madam SPEAKER: Is that your only copy?
Dr BURNS: That is my own copy; I would like to get it back.
Madam SPEAKER: You will get a copy from the Table Office staff.
Dr LIM (Greatorex): Madam Speaker, I believe that it is very appropriate and right that I start at the very back of her statement where she said she was delighted to discover that the Northern Territory has a very strong foundation upon which to build Territory Health Services into a first class service and that a strong foundation was the dedicated team of people at Territory Health Services. I could not agree with her more. I believe that our Territory health professionals are second to none in the country. They work very, very hard and it is because of their professionalism and their dedication that we have such a good health service in the Territory. Having worked with Territory professionals across the Territory, from north to south, but especially in Central Australia, I take my hat off to them. Their dedication is fantastic, the hours that they work and the hardship that they have to undergo to look after patients who continually pour through the front doors is just remarkable. I commend the minister for also congratulating the staff there.
I want to go through the minister’s statement carefully and just talk about a few of the comments that she made. In particular, I draw her attention to page 3 where she said that in Alice Springs she saw recently in the media that people were living in the river banks. I was particularly interested in that issue; there was indeed a photograph printed in the Centralian Advocate of Aboriginal people sitting on the banks of the Todd River claiming to also be attending renal dialysis.
I spoke to Territory Housing at that time asking why these people were not housed in appropriate accommodation as Territory Housing has accommodation set aside for renal dialysis patients. In the following investigation it was found, and this is through direct interviews with the people who were sitting on the river bank, that they were indeed housed within Territory Housing, and the Minister for Housing should know that, too, if he were adequately briefed by his department. Those people who were photographed had chosen to go to the Todd River, where they were meeting with other people, to await their transportation to the renal dialysis unit. That is the fact of the story. So, there are no people living in the Todd River as you suggested in your speech. I hope you will take time to look into that and rectify that comment in your statement.
You talk about renal disease and that it is caused by childhood streptococcal infections, diet, diabetes, and high blood pressure. These are types of diseases that people suffer through lifestyle choices. Now, it is lifestyle choices because ...
Mr Kiely interjecting.
Dr LIM: The member for Sanderson continues to interrupt and I look forward to hearing his debate. More than likely he will not stand up to debate because, as you know, empty vessels do make the most noise. However, let’s proceed.
Lifestyle choices are things that we choose for ourselves. Sure, there are instances where people may not be able to access levels of accommodation that you and I enjoy, but that is another story and I would love to hear what the Minister for Housing would have to say about the choice of housing for our indigenous people.
Lifestyle choices means that we have the opportunity to correct some of those if we wish to, if we knew how to and if we had the means to do so. I believe that the former Territory government had put many things in place to assist many people, including our indigenous population, to do that. It is not an easy task and I look forward to the success rate that the current minister for health will have in her coming years. Of course, when you compare what we have in the Northern Territory with what is happening interstate, you cannot say that there is a national scandal about what has happened in the Northern Territory in the last 26 years. We heard the member for Drysdale speak about how long we have had self-government. Since self-government, the health facilities and health provision in the Territory has increased significantly.
It is rubbish to say that the CLP government provided nothing. All you have to do is just compare what we had at the start of self-government to what we have today. The hospitals in Darwin, Alice Springs, Tennant Creek and Katherine are all reasonably new hospitals and the current upgrading of those hospitals are indications that the former government was very committed to the services that have been provided for Territorians.
When the minister commented about hospital separation for indigenous Territorians being so much higher than the non-indigenous population, she fails to recognise that apart from the great mix of illnesses that our indigenous population suffer from, that trauma contributes a very high percentage of hospitalisations and if not hospitalisation, at least admissions into emergency departments for services. Trauma is a fact of life, unfortunately, for many of our indigenous people. In Alice Springs, for instance, where I know a lot about, it is a common topic of discussion among health professionals that in summer we have many indigenous people presenting to the emergency department because of alcohol and trauma, and in winter it is alcohol and burns, which is another form of trauma. That is the unfortunate pattern of behaviour.
How can we change that? That is the vexed issue. I believe that our previous health ministers have addressed that in the best way they possibly can within the resources that we have. When we spend 47% of the health budget on Aboriginal care it is a significant commitment by the former government towards looking after our indigenous population in the Territory. You cannot say that the Northern Territory government in former years has neglected them. You cannot say that we are not looking after them, yet we are spending 47% of our budget. Either we are or we are not.
The minister quoted the former minister, the member for Drysdale, about the diseases in the Northern Territory from 1979-95 that 23% or nearly quarter of all deaths in the Northern Territory were due to kidney diseases, diabetes, high blood pressure, ischaemic heart disease or chronic lung disease. The member for Johnston also quoted those figures about death rates in the Northern Territory versus Australia.
Lifestyle diseases are things that we can do something about ourselves and that is what we have been doing over the last 10 to 15 years. The health professionals have worked very hard to convince their patients that they have to make lifestyle choices. Lung cancer is directly proportional to the number of cigarettes you smoke, everybody knows that. Diabetes, particularly Type 2 diabetes, is directly proportional to the weight that you gain from the food that you eat, or the level of exercise that you take. Respiratory disease is no different from lung cancer, it is the same sort of thing. That again is due to lifestyle diseases.
You have to recognise also that the Northern Territory government, under the CLP, started vaccinations of all newborn children.
Mr Kiely: It is a Commonwealth program.
Dr LIM: It does not matter what program it is, it is something that the Northern Territory government adopted and provided to Territorians. It is important to do that, and so, Territorians benefit through Northern Territory government programs.
As regards injury, well, let’s go back a little bit in history. Back in 1900, the average life span of an Australian was 43 years. Why did they die so early? From hard work, working out in the bush, trauma. You got a broken leg and you died of septicaemia. You got broken ribs and you died of pneumonia. Those were a natural progression of the injuries that people received back in 1900. By 1950, people were living until they were 63 years of age through the discovery of sulphur drugs, penicillin, better lifestyle, better food and better quality of life. At the turn of this century, the Year 2000, the average life span had increased to somewhere near 83 years of age. In 100 years, the average life span of an Australian had almost doubled.
Almost doubled. Why? Because of lifestyle choices, of improved health care, of improved medical science. And Aboriginal people had the opportunity - unfortunately, I believe - when some social events occurred, such as the 1966 or 1967 referendum, that allowed them open slather access to alcohol without any socialisation of their lifestyle with alcohol.
Mr Bonson interjecting.
Dr LIM: You laugh. The member for Millner laughs and I suggest to him that he looks back into history and look at it.
There are races that have socialised with alcohol for millenia, and others have not. It is no different than the abuse of kava where, in some societies, the socialising of that drug, or drink, occurred with your lifestyle. This is what is happening with the kava abuse in the Northern Territory. It is unfortunate, I believe, that members opposite tend to be a little bit deaf about that. They want to talk about politically correct issues - open your minds and look at it in an objective light.
The minister spoke very superficially about her focus on drugs. I was a little bit surprised, after having read through their policy document, that she has so little to talk about her drug policy. She talks about her three point plan but fails to elaborate, to show us what she intends to do. She speaks nothing about what she plans to do with rehabilitation, what she plans to do about social drug abuse. She does not talk to us about what she plans to do with the methadone program, which I believe is in her party’s policy, and she needs to be honest with Territorians and spell out exactly what she plans to do. There is no mention in her statement about Buprenorphine, which is one of the new drugs that has recently been recommended nationally for use in drug addiction. I hope the minister in her response closing debate will deal with some of those issues.
As regards the use of morphine that the member for Johnston spoke about, the way he came across, one would have thought that every doctor in the Northern Territory has been prescribing morphine willy nilly without due care for the patient’s wellbeing, and …
Dr Burns: That is not what I said.
Dr LIM: I think that is the way that the member for Johnston came across. If I am wrong then I believe that he needs to then rephrase his words. Most doctors in the Northern Territory are very ethical and professional people, and would use all forms of drugs to the best benefit of their patients, and slagging doctors is, in my opinion, unnecessary and in error. There were indeed some doctors who were abusing their privilege and their legal authority to prescribe Schedule 8 drugs, and those doctors have been identified and, indeed, some have been punished. I believe that is a proper way of ensuring that the medial profession adheres to their privilege of writing prescriptions for Schedule 8 drugs. If you do that you will have a fairly good control of legally prescribed Schedule 8 drugs out on the streets.
It is not an easy task, many a time, for a doctor to identify whether a person is in real pain or is looking for narcotics to use in their drug addiction. When a person is going through narcotic drug withdrawal, that person is actually feeling pain, pain that is identical to any other organic pain you can name. It is not an easy task for the doctor to identify what is causing the pain. Ask any doctor you like, I suggest to the health minister, and she will find out for sure for herself whether I am right or not.
I am happy with the minister’s statement in that she supports what Territory Health Services has been doing over many years. I am happy that she recognises the quality of our professional staff, and I look forward to her working closely with the staff, because I believe they will give her good advice. However, I would like to see more detail from her about her drug program that she is talking about. I would like to see more detail as to how she will address the lifestyle diseases that our indigenous population suffer from, and how she proposes to turn the rate of illnesses around, especially among the indigenous people. I look forward to seeing her improve renal care services. I congratulate the minister and her government on making a promise that they will introduce renal services into Tennant Creek.
Mr HENDERSON (Industries and Business): Madam Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to speak in this debate tonight in terms of it being the first statement on health from the new health minister in the Labor government. I wish the minister well in what is a very challenging portfolio area and one which I covered for two years in opposition. Certainly, we on this side of the House, this government acknowledges, as well as the previous government, that it is a very challenging portfolio area. One of the few things I will agree with the former health minister , the member for Drysdale on, in his contribution to the debate, is that, yes, you will always have people coming to you saying if we spend more money in this area we will get better outcomes. The great challenge for health is trying to get improved outcomes within acceptable budget frameworks.
My contribution to this debate is to look at the record of the previous government in terms of health outcomes. At the end of the day, that is what we should be judged on in terms of implementation of public policy across all areas, and outcomes is one of them.
My colleague, the member for Johnston, was very eloquent in terms of his exposure - and I did speak in the previous parliament about the Mortality in the Northern Territory 1979-1997 document. That is a significant period of time to track health outcomes in the Northern Territory, certainly within all the boundaries of statistics. Those outcomes are not based on aberrations; they are very real over time. That is where the rhetoric of the previous government in terms of the great improvements in the health system in the Northern Territory, falls down. I would urge all members of this House to actually get a copy of that document, to go through the tables disease category by disease category, and look at the tables and understand what is happening here in terms of the health profile of Territorians, both indigenous and non-indigenous. Take the politics out of it and have an objective analysis of that document - and I would urge all honourable members to do that - and be informed about what is happening in regard to public health in the Northern Territory.
There is no doubt over that period, from 1979 to 1997, in comparison with all other Australian jurisdictions, we have gone backwards. That is the bottom line: we have gone backwards. We have gone backwards in terms of indigenous health and non-indigenous health. Now they are the outcomes. Yes, we have good health facilities. The majority of the funding for those facilities in our urban centres has come from the Commonwealth through - certainly in recent times - Medicare funding. But the outcomes in terms of public health in the Northern Territory, have gone backwards over that period 1979 to 1997.
In previous debates in this parliament, I challenged the former health minister as to why that document was never published. Why there was never a public launch of the document in the same manner that its predecessor, Morbidity and Mortality in the Northern Territory 1979-1991, was actually published at that time with a great deal of fanfare. I was having academics, health professionals, come to me asking ‘Where is this document? We know that it has been collated; we know it has been put together, we have all had input into providing the figures and the statistics, but it has never been published’.
Dr Burns: We know why.
Mr HENDERSON: Well, as my colleague interjects, we know why. It is such an abysmal tale, such a poor reflection on public health policy over the period of previous CLP administrations, that it was never released, it was sat on, and it never saw the light of day.
This is the legacy that we have to move forward from as a new government in the Northern Territory, paying due attention to health and public health policies. I suppose one of the worst statistics out of that document - and I am not going to trawl through them again - is that the gap between indigenous and non-indigenous life expectancy has increased from 18.7 years in the period 1981-1985, to 22.2 years in 1996-97. We have the gap in terms of life expectancy between indigenous and non-indigenous Territorians actually getting bigger. That is really an appalling statistic in this day and age.
The previous health minister spoke about the former parliament’s Public Accounts Committee report on Aboriginal health. That was a bipartisan committee of this parliament that did produce a seminal piece of work in regards to that report. We as a government will actually be auditing the recommendations from that Public Accounts Committee report - which I believe reported to this parliament in 1997, if my memory serves me correctly - just to see how much and how many of those recommendations from that bipartisan committee report were actually ever implemented by previous governments.
Starting from a point of outcomes, I would challenge any objective analysis by any members opposite to actually look at that mortality report 1979 to 1997 and say that previous governments in the Northern Territory had good stewardship of public health policy and actually achieved real successes, because the truth lies in the statistics. Certainly, the previous administration has nothing to crow about.
Moving on to other issues that have been raised in the minister’s statement, the vexed issue of renal failure in the Northern Territory. Again, as a shadow minister in this House, I brought renal failure forward as a Matter of Public Importance. Again, we would have to say there are great professionals in the Northern Territory who have been doing fantastic work in terms of studies; in terms of understanding the causes of renal failure in the Northern Territory; and putting in place programs to pick up the indicators early so that we can improve, with communities, the lifestyle issues that will prevent end-stage renal failure occurring and the expensive treatment of dialysis. Look at Wendy Hoy and the work that she did in the Tiwi Islands. Much work was done - the screening programs were put in place, strategies were put in place - that showed marked improvement in terms of the prevalence of end-stage renal failure in the Tiwi Islands.
Again, we had a strategy that was worked up, that was developed, and then the previous administrations failed to systemically implement that strategy across the Northern Territory, despite its proven successes. We debated this previously in the House and the former health minister would say: ‘Well, look, as a government we are not into templating solutions across the Northern Territory’. Well, I can say that this government is certainly going to be looking at strategies that work, strategies that have been proven to work, and looking at systemic implementation of those strategies over time. Because at the end of the day, there are enormous dollars to be saved, let alone qualities of life improved, by improving health at the base level in communities. Certainly, for screening programs for infant children in communities to pick up problems in the early childhood stages, we have committed to 25 child health nurses. This is where we can make an impact and where previous administrations failed in terms of doing the preventative work at the beginning.
The previous health minister has acknowledged - and I do not have the media report in front of me here, it was on the public record - that people do go off into the bush to die in the Northern Territory. It is a choice that they make in terms of having to relocate from rural communities to go to either Alice Springs or Darwin for treatment. This is not an option for many Territorians in terms of leaving their family, leaving their country at a time of their life when they are very sick. The previous minister, the member for Drysdale, has acknowledged on the public record that people do go off into the bush to die. Well, yes that is their choice. That is the choice that they make, but what an appalling choice that those people have been forced to make. To blindly say, ‘That is the way it is. We are not going to be looking at putting these services into regional communities’, and the blind acceptance that if people want to choose to wander off into the bush and die – well, it certainly would not be accepted in an urban setting. This government is not going to accept that philosophy. We will put those renal services into Tennant Creek and progressively strive to put them into other regional centres as well. The choice of life or death to access fairly common medical treatment is not a choice that should be forced onto Territorians, regardless of their background.
Moving to the Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy, again my colleague, the member for Johnston, who was involved in his previous life in terms of various committees - and again, we have debated it in this House. I think the first statement that I responded to as a shadow health minister was the original tabling statement of the Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy. We all agree - it is the one thing that everybody agrees on - it is a fantastic strategy and a lot of hard work went into it. Our criticism was that it was never systemically implemented; it was never appropriately funded. It was a document that could be held up and championed as being a seminal piece of work that saw the light of day to great accolades around the country, in terms of medical conferences, but we have wasted two years in the Northern Territory in terms of implementing that strategy. It is something that this government is going to be moving very quickly to do.
Again, everything costs money and it is all a matter of priorities but, to use an old analogy, prevention is better than a cure and it is certainly the only piece of work that we have that has total commitment from the medical academic community through to the practicing community through to indigenous organisations. We have to look at how we dovetail that strategy into the new health zones in terms of giving people the responsibility for making decisions regarding health in those communities. But it is certainly one that we are going to be moving ahead on and it is certainly one that the previous government could never demonstrate any real commitment to the implementation of that strategy.
Moving onto the issue of drugs. We have debated illicit drugs and the previous government’s attitude to the public policy that they adopted in terms of illicit drugs, in terms of the health strategy and the law and order strategy at the time. We had numerous debates in this House. I just want to put on the public record and quote from the previous Chief Minister, now Leader of the Opposition, in response to a question from the current Chief Minister on 9 August 2000. Reading from the Hansard, the question was in regard to drug-related crime, and I will quote from the Hansard for the Leader of the Opposition:
So there is the Hansard quote. Compared to other jurisdictions, drug-related crime in the Northern Territory is miniscule. He was quoting the previous Chief Minister, the now Leader of the Opposition, with that head-in-the-sand approach and attitude to what was happening in the Northern Territory, and in Darwin and Palmerston in particular, about drug-related crime.
If there is one issue in terms of health policy that I am passionate about, it is to be moving very quickly on this issue to get some public policy, decent public policy together in the Northern Territory to actually start winding back on the appalling legacy that we have inherited in regards to public drug policy in the Northern Territory which is the laughing stock of the rest of Australia.
Mr Dunham: And they have it worked out. They’ve got it by the throat down there in Cabramatta.
Mr HENDERSON: No. Madam Speaker, if we just look at some facts in terms of what is happening in the Northern Territory, what happened under the previous administration and the explosion in drug use and drug-related crime that occurred particularly over the last five to 10 years, and members opposite who practiced law and the legal profession and who had to stand in criminal trials and hear mitigating circumstances over and over and over and over again in regards to the part that drugs played and the use that drugs played in terms of crime in the Northern Territory, those facts will come to light.
Let’s look at a couple of figures. They have been quoted in this House before, but for new members who may not be aware, in the last year the Northern Territory AIDS Council in Darwin - and the previous health minister talked about have we visited the AIDS Council and Banyan House and Howard’s tough-on-drugs strategies - 460 000 needles were distributed into the Darwin and Palmerston population. 460 000 needles. Over the last three years, I think the rate of distribution of these needles has seen about a 30% increase per year - this is the minuscule problem that we have in the Northern Territory - predominantly being used for morphine and amphetamines – an explosion in the use of amphetamines as well. We had morphine prescription rates at nine times the national average, which were never acknowledged by the previous government until it was raised with alarm by the Health Insurance Commission because essentially a fraud was being perpetrated on the PBS system in terms of the amount of morphine that was being prescribed.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker. The member is alleging there was a fraud on the PBS system. The previous speaker talked about doctors acting illicitly. I think it is only fair to those people outside the House that this be demonstrated.
Madam SPEAKER: Did you use the term ‘fraud’?
Mr HENDERSON: Madam Speaker, the words I used were that there was a fraud being perpetrated on the PBS system. I was not accusing a member opposite of fraud.
Madam SPEAKER: There is no point of order. In that context, it is okay.
Mr HENDERSON: Madam Speaker, as a point of clarification, the member for Johnston, and the Parliamentary Record will prove him out, did not state that doctors were involved in illicit prescribing practices. What we had at the time, and probably still have today in terms of what is happening out there, is a prescription rate of morphine that is in excess of the average ratios of the other states. That is as a direct result of the public policy that the previous administration had in regards to failing to approve and allow methadone for drug maintenance and detox, for failing to approve and allow new drugs such as buprenorphine and naltrexone. Despite talking about these things and saying ‘We are looking at them,’ there was no alternative regime for clinical practitioners in the Northern Territory to actually refer people on to for appropriate treatment.
A direct consequence of the public policy was this explosion in morphine and the numbers that my colleague, the member for Johnston, put before this House in terms of the diversion of that morphine into the black market to a $10m a year criminal trade – and you can do the numbers yourself based on the average price on the street for a tablet of morphine at $50 a throw – and we can see what an enormous consequence and an impact that this drug use in the Territory, illicit drug use, was having on crime. Because the people who are addicted, the people who have an addiction, have to feed that addiction. They are obviously not working. Where do they get the money from? You do not need to be a rocket scientist to work out that they are breaking into peoples houses, breaking into peoples businesses - the Northern Territory News has been full of examples - to steal other people’s property to sell to feed their drug habit because the previous Northern Territory government did not have in place public policy that recognised the extent of the problem and provided for treatment services.
If we look at Banyan House, the only opiate treatment facility in the Northern Territory, as I have said in this House before and we will be working with Banyan House, it was an election commitment to upgrade that, is you wouldn’t kennel your dog out there. I have been to Banyan House. They are great people out there who are doing a fantastic job in appalling circumstances. The previous government had promised them verbally on a number of occasions that they would get an injection of funds to upgrade that facility, but of course because it was never a priority, it never happened. One of the huge advances that we can make as a government, and we will make, is not to bury our head in the sand, to acknowledge the appalling statistics and the appalling tide of frailty in our community in terms of what is happening with illicit drug use, the consequences for families, for community in general, the impact on crime statistics and we will be moving to redress that situation. I am not arguing that we are going to eliminate illicit drug use. We are never going to be able to do that, but we have to be able to do a hell of a lot better than what we are doing at the moment.
Moving on to hospital funding, another key area. The member for Drysdale is always quick to interject, ‘Well, they got the money. Didn’t they get the money?’ The point that we were making and the health minister was making in the statement is that our hospitals, our public hospitals, in terms of the operation of funding to run our public hospital system in the Northern Territory over many years, has been underfunded. The only reason - and the figures in the minister’s statement bear out the fact - that the Royal Darwin Hospital actual expenditure averaged over the period 1995-96 to 1999-2000 - so not just in the year that we had to respond to the Timor crisis - the average over those five years was 7.7% more than was budgeted for. For the other hospitals across the Northern Territory, where the Timor crisis did not impact, the result over that period was 6.4% more.
The pressures of that underfunding on our public hospital system in terms of the management regimes in the hospital, the decisions that have to be made on a daily basis in terms of equipment purchases, staffing ratios, the capacity to recruit and retain specialists, managers are all given at the beginning of the financial year a budget to manage to and quite appropriately, there is significant pressure on those managers to deliver in terms of bringing in expenditure on or under budget. The problem with the previous administration’s funding scenarios was the growth that was totally predicted year on year was never …
Madam SPEAKER: Order, the honourable member’s time has expired.
Mr ELFERINK (Macdonnell): Madam Speaker, I rise just to raise a couple of comments and questions for the minister for health. I can say that I was heartily mortified when I heard from the member for Johnston that some $10m worth of illicit morphine was allowed into the community. Indeed, it was supported by the honourable minister who has just sat down. I confess that I am deeply concerned by this because as I understand it, there was an inquiry into this process of prescribing drugs for the market place and two doctors were struck off or had their licences revoked to prescribe medicine. I would like to know from the minister first, whether or not she agrees with the figure that was placed on morphine in the community that the member for Johnston told us, and second, if you do agree with that figure, I am deeply concerned that only two doctors have been struck off, unless those two doctors are responsible between themselves for prescribing some $10m worth of morphine into the community. It sounds like you have a major problem, minister. Second, my question is that, if the honourable member for Johnston was aware of this horrible trade, did he report it to police? I am wondering if the minister can advise whether or not the member for Johnston actually had approached her at any stage in relation to this matter.
Madam Speaker, I am not going to enter into the Ministerial Statement per se, but I am intrigued by this document that the member for Johnston had tabled in this Chamber at the request of the member for Drysdale in accordance with standing orders. I was horrified to hear the allegation that the Northern Territory government had sat on a report simply because it did not suit the Northern Territory government’s outcomes. So, I have taken the opportunity to get that copy and, to my surprise, on the inside cover is a notation. It is the first page in, Roman numerals II: ‘This work is subject to copyright. It may be reproduced in whole or in part or for study or training purposes’ – yada, yada, yada as the usual copyright disclaimer suggests.
The second item down the page is a suggested citation for the purposes of future reference by other people who read the document. The next area down is the copyright, ‘Copyright 1999 by Territory Health Services. Printed by the Government Printer of the Northern Territory’, and then it provides an ISBN, 0724533648. It was printed in November 1999. This highly secretive, suppressed document was published and Madam Speaker, just as I am on my feet, the Attendant has entered this Chamber with the secret document, the secret, suppressed document that was secretly suppressed in our library for reference of anybody who wanted to pick up and read it. It is an absolute …
Dr Burns: Never publicly released.
Mr ELFERINK: It is on the library bookshelf, you dill. It is sitting on the library bookshelf. This is a copy I just got from the library. Any member of the public can look into that library. Madam Speaker, it is incumbent upon members in this Chamber when they come into this Chamber to tell the truth, not to mislead this Chamber. There is no suppression of any documents here. This was a published document; it was not secreted away. What does the member for Johnston recommend? What does the member for Johnston recommend, a glossy? The glossy that his colleagues are so critical of. Perhaps we should have trumpeters every time that the Northern Territory government publishes something.
This is an absolutely outrageous attempt to try to build a cloak and dagger environment around the former government for his own furtive purposes. And if he wants to maintain so much as a shred of integrity in this place, then he should come in here and tell the people of the Northern Territory the truth.
Ms CARTER (Port Darwin): Madam Speaker, I feel I must respond to the minister’s paper. However, I certainly was disappointed to realise halfway into her delivery that we had received a draft rather than the final paper, so I must say that the comments that I am about to make now generally have been made and prepared relative to the first paper. So we are going to draw on the first paper.
Just to put it in perspective where I am coming from, I would like to share with members my background in the health system. It has been a long and varied background over the last 20 years since self-government. In 1979, I came to Darwin as a Registered Nurse and worked at the Royal Darwin Hospital. In 1980, I moved to the then called Casuarina Hospital now Royal Darwin Hospital and worked for some time in the Accident and Emergency department and then for some years in the orthopaedic department. In the mid-1980s I studied at the Northern Territory University and then worked at the Darwin Private Hospital part time. In 1989, I moved to Katherine and was the Nurse Educator for the Katherine district. That included the remote area nurses as well as the hospital and community nurses. In 1993, I moved back to Darwin to work in the Women’s Health Unit particularly in the area of cancer prevention. I then went to Batchelor College as a senior lecturer working with the Aboriginal health workers, then moved back to Darwin to work in health promotion particularly in the quit smoking area. I then moved to the Work Health Authority for several years, running the education program there and finally, prior to assuming this position, I was working for several years as an investigator in the Health and Community Services Complaints Commission.
Thank you for your tolerance in letting me list that resume. The reason I do so is to demonstrate the variety of roles I have held within the health system, both public and private, over the last 20 years which of course gives me a certain perspective when commenting on the minister’s statement. I will also say that I tend to be a very honest person. I am fairly direct in the comments that I make and I am not particularly politically correct. That may or not be a fault but I am not one of them.
So, here we go. I accept that this is the first ministerial statement from the minister and from my point of view it is a fairly weak effort that has been wasted. It has been wasted on an attempt at political point scoring which, to my point of view, has been fairly pointless. We have many health problems here in the Northern Territory, just as most if not all jurisdictions do, and I think to a degree this has been a waste of time. In the last week and a bit that we have been here since we have come back into the Chamber swapping sides, we have seen that the government is spending a great deal of time going on and on and on about the previous government’s work. Quite frankly, the problems we face as a community need us to look to the future. I accept that we will cop a bit of a blasting but today’s effort from the minister was disappointing in that over 50% if not more of her statement was really concentrating on the previous government’s work rather than looking towards the future and what her government is going to do.
With regard to health problems though, being someone who has been looking at them for several decades now, I look with interest at the problems in other jurisdictions in Australia and overseas, looking to see how they are solving their problems. For all of us, we are all here with one goal in mind and that is to better the health of the people in our community and to better our communities. It is certainly disappointing across the world to see how difficult it is to have really solid inroads into health improvement, and it is a frustrating area and it is one which we all face.
What the new government should be doing is being very careful in the kind of promises that they are making. You have made some extraordinary claims today as to how you are going to, or what you are going to, achieve in your health program. In a couple of years’ time you are going to see Territorians across the board looking at these claims and thinking, ‘Gosh! Nothing really changed’. You need to temper some of your plans or your goals, the things that you think that you are going to achieve, because regardless of which jurisdiction you look at in Australia - and many of them of course now are headed by Labor governments and I can talk specifically about New South Wales and Queensland, neither of these jurisdictions have a faultless health program. I would argue that if you went to, for example, an Aboriginal community in the Territory and then to one over the border in Queensland, you would see very little difference and yet it has had a Labor government for quite a few years. So, be very careful with the promises that you are making.
I wonder whether this statement today - and I wonder how many people had a finger in the pie, so to speak; I wonder who wrote it. It certainly struck me that whoever had the major input into it has a pathological hatred of the CLP. It came through really loud and strong there and I do not think that that was overly constructive. So, rather than having a passion for health which many of us share, and I suspect your new minister does, too, this real hatred of the previous government came through loud and clear. It was over the top and disappointing.
So let’s go to Aboriginal health. This is a very difficult area, regardless of your jurisdiction, regardless almost of your country. If you go to the United States, if you go to Canada, both of those communities also have major problems with the health of their indigenous people. Certainly, if you look at the health of the first Americans, their health and some of their problems are very similar to our Aboriginal people. So blaming this previous government, to my mind, serves no purpose. It wastes time and effort. It is very easy to do, to blame a distant person or a distant entity for your troubles, and many people in our community do that. Rank and file members of our community, when the going gets tough, see who they can blame rather than look in upon themselves and ask what they can change about themselves in order to get somewhere.
I am certainly a feminist, and with the feminist movement kicking off in the 1960s, one of the things that the feminists did was look very much at themselves as women, and at various other groups, and to say, ‘Listen, governments per se are not really helping us. We as women need to grab the agenda and to do the work ourselves’. I do applaud any measure to empower Aboriginal people to do the same thing, because you will really get nowhere unless it is the actual people who are making the changes and making the differences. But often those changes are difficult, as the member for Greatorex pointed out. Lifestyle diseases are often a result of personal behaviour, and those things need to be changed at a personal level. Not easy to do, and for those of you who smoke, as I know some do, certainly some on our side of the House here, they would know in particular how difficult it is to change your behaviour.
Let’s look instead at a very good document that came out last year - and I know I am going to get howls of abuse when I mention it, but it is certainly something I feel has a lot of value, and that is the Collins Report. What I particularly admired in that document was the way that he brought into the discussions the need for the people in Aboriginal communities to be involved in the process, and to take some responsibility for how things are going to operate. For my mind, the Collins Report can be tied into health, and that health activities and health programs need to look at what has been suggested there at a health level, to be looking for community involvement and people who live in communities to say: ‘We need to change some things here’.
I remember when I was the Nurse Educator in the Katherine area, there was an excellent video produced that we used as part of our orientation program, a two day program I used to run, for new nurses to the area. The first day of the program was very heavily involved with Aboriginal cultural issues, to explain to nurses, particularly those from overseas, about where they are in the Katherine district, often people who are working with the Aboriginal culture and living the Aboriginal culture coming to hospital, and to have a better understanding of how to help these people. The video that I am talking about, I cannot remember the name of it, but the gist of it was it was set in Canada with Canadian Indians, and it dealt with alcohol problems in their community. The whole message of this video was how important it was for people in a community to take control of the situation and to make the hard decisions themselves for the betterment of their community. There are communities in Canada and in the United States that have done very well with this sort of a program that has been run by the people themselves.
You mentioned in your statement, chronic diseases, for example heart and lung disease. I said earlier that these are very often caused by lifestyle choices such as smoking and diet. People really do have to take some responsibility for their behaviour. However, I certainly feel that many remote area community stores - and there has been a fair bit of research on this - charge a very high rate for some of the standard healthy foods, and certainly there needs to be more done in the area of trying to assist remote area communities to access good food, healthy food, at a reasonable price.
Also, of course, is the need for education on lifestyle issues, and certainly we can do more in that area as well. But in the end - and I can speak from my experience in the quit smoking program - in the end, it is down to the individual to make those choices. Here in Darwin, for example, and members of the parliament, welcome to the new parliamentary family - I know when I came in as a member of parliament here, one of the choices that I had to make very early on was the need to be careful with my diet. There might be guffaws from the House on that one, but the reality is that as parliamentarians we are invited to numerous functions, be they here in Parliament House or out in the community, and the end result for some of us is putting on weight. Really, it is only down to one person as to whether or not you can control that, and that is yourself. It is not always easy to do, to control the intake at these functions that we go to.
So it is not easy, as I say, to control behaviour when you are being tempted, be it by fatty foods, either here in Darwin or out in remote communities, or being tempted by cigarettes or things of that nature. In the end …
Ms Carney: Alcohol as well.
Ms CARTER: As the member for Araluen says, alcohol as well. So all of these temptations come before us and, looking around the House at the moment, I can say most of us are making very healthy choices, and I congratulate you on that. We do have to make those choices, and they are not easy to make, regardless of who you are or where you are. There is a significant element in health that is based on the behaviour of the individual.
I look forward to an increase in Aboriginal involvement in health care decisions, and I do hope that it improves the outcomes there. Many contacts that I have out bush, and I still have them, believe that out there at the moment, since the Labor government was elected, the expectations in remote area health clinics is extremely high that things are really going to change. Once again, I wonder at the level of disappointment that might occur in a couple of year’s time. I do again counsel you to be careful of the sort of promises that you are making, because people are listening and their expectations are going to be very high, and I am concerned about the level of disappointment they might have if they do not come to fruition.
On page 3 of the first version of the ministerial statement that was put out, the minister quotes some statistics and, to my mind, they are very creative. There has really been no attempt made to compare apples with apples. They do not really add up at all. The Northern Territory situation is very different from the southern situation. For example, with non-indigenous people, we have a low hospitalisation rate because we are substantially younger than our southern counterparts. These statistical interpretations have been used to cloud certain issues; we are a younger population in the non-Aboriginal groupings.
When I talk about expectations - I mentioned earlier Queensland, Western Australia, and New South Wales, all areas that have large Aboriginal communities living in remote areas. You cannot look across Australia and see vast differences in Aboriginal health outcomes. As I say, I wish you well in the programs that you are going to put into place but I do have some doubt as to how beneficial they will be in the long run given that your vitriolic attack on the former government implying that our gross mismanagement is the only reason that Aboriginal health is in the poor state that it is in today. Other jurisdictions also have problems there.
You are going to - and I am pleased to see - combat, sounds like a very total word, illicit drug use. To my mind, this is another piece of rhetoric. It reminds me of a fellow who once promised that there would be no child living in Australia in poverty, more rhetoric. Up go the expectations again. With regard to illicit drug use, you have had a Labor government in power in New South Wales for many, many years and, although I am not conversant with all of the drug statistics, my suspicion is that they would have the biggest drug problem in this country. Labor has not helped them.
As a person who is qualified in the area of health promotion, I am interested to see that you are going to, with regard to drugs, force people into rehabilitation - what you describe as ‘compulsory treatment’. It is absolutely pointless to force people into treatment or into rehabilitation. Behaviour only changes when a person really wants to change it and to my mind, compulsory rehabilitation treatment is going to be absolutely useless. Good luck with that one.
Methadone of course is a very popular topic and I look forward to being involved in the subcommittee or in a committee being organised at the moment looking at drug issues here in the Territory. I will be interested to contribute to the debate on methadone. It is a topic that interests me and in that interest, I have done a number of library searchers on the topic of methadone and got some very interesting stuff in the process. I am unable to quote directly from a particular article at the moment because it is down at my electorate office, but there is a paper available that has an interview with a person who is currently a drug addict. He talks about how methadone is essentially a gift to addicts when they cannot be bothered using heroin or whatever it might be. They will use methadone for a short period of time, but when it suits them to go back into the social event of drug use, or whatever it might be, then they will go back into the use of illicit and illegal drugs. So, to his point of view, methadone is an absolute cop out, and I believe that was the term that he used, a cop out, because it really does not solve anything. It is just a replacement drug.
It does not help them move one way or the other. It is a replacement drug. As the member for Port Darwin, I am particularly interested to know where you are going to place the methadone clinic, because I suspect it is going to come into my electorate. I am very concerned, naturally, that that means we are going to see an increase in people living in this electorate who use illicit drugs. One week they will be using the methadone program, and the next week, well, they might go and knock over a few houses and do something else. They might do this, they might do that, and they will leave their needles lying around. So needless to say, wherever you are going to put your methadone clinics, we will all be very interested to see that, and be interested to see how our community members respond to that.
I agree with the member for Drysdale; I will be interested to see your commitment to the DARE program which has been a positive thing that the Territory police have been doing for many years, and we would like to see an ongoing commitment to that.
Mr Deputy Speaker, I will conclude by saying that I consider the statement to be disappointing, negative, certainly very idealistic and to my mind it lacks a certain degree of pragmatism. As government members, you are going to be working to the constraints of a budget and in years to come, you are going to find it a difficult thing to do. I wish you all the best with it. The CLP looks to the future; the ALP looks to the past. The ALP has given this community huge expectations. I realise that you consider it very enjoyable to blame the CLP for everything that is going on at the moment, but you had better get over it quickly. You do not have time to waste and you will find this a difficult experience.
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Mr Deputy Speaker, I would like to confine my comments to the areas of health delivery in the remote areas. In doing this, I want to canvass some of the issues where the Labor party’s policy impacts on the delivery of health services in electorates such as Stuart and Macdonnell. I would like to talk a little bit more about dialysis in remote communities which some of the long standing members would know has been a interest of mine.
The Labor party policy on service delivery generally is that wherever possible, we want to mediate that delivery for indigenous people and remote communities through appropriate groups that are drawn together or express interest in that area of government service delivery. So we are really moving in the direction of the cashed up arrangements such as were put into the Tiwi Islands and the Katherine West Health Board. The purpose of going in that direction is to build indigenous priorities and indigenous perceptions and more widely than indigenous people, the many people who are involved in government service delivery in remote communities of a non-indigenous background. It is very easy to forget that we have dedicated teachers, we have dedicated nurses, doctors and administrators out in the communities. You often hear about the dysfunctional things that come out and the horror stories of things that have gone wrong, but what you do not generally hear about is people who are there, day after day, week after week, year after year, doing really solid work and trying to hold together what is increasingly difficult situation.
Many of the factors that they are wrestling with have a much broader nature than you can hope to control in an individual community - the drift into town of adults, the high turnover of staff generally in these institutions such as remote schools and clinics - all make it a real challenge to follow your profession, follow your committed area of work in that context. It is equally difficult for indigenous people who have gone through the training to become health workers, become teachers and to shape their practice, not only against the expectations of the various departments that deliver the services out there, but also to harmonise them with their family obligations and their cultural obligations. It is not easy, and it is not easy for the non-indigenous people out there to work in partnership with people within the organisation.
First of all, I would like to pay tribute to the enormous positive outcomes that have been achieved by our best and fairest out there in the bush, and will continue to be achieved - against all odds at times. I would also like to underwrite that the statistics that we heard earlier on from the member for Johnston regarding the continued deterioration in indigenous health are very real. They are very much part of many factors and in fact to make inroads into those health profiles is going to take an enormous and concerted effort.
What our policy says is that we have tried it the old way; we have tried it for fifty years, long before self-government when the Commonwealth was running services in this part of Australia. We have tried to centralise decision making; put the package out of the generic packages, of saying this is how a health service should look, or a school, or an education program. It hasn’t got us anywhere. We have not managed to attach our schooling to employment. We have not managed to attach health to education. We have not managed to attach the lifestyle of our remote communities to the type of government support, the types of aims that the government programs are attempting in that context.
So, it is time for a major rethink about how services are delivered to our remote communities. I think the starting point has to be the local people, whether they are non-indigenous or indigenous, working through a secure decision making process. Now, government cannot withdraw from that. Obviously, we have to have some moderation of what goes on in a school or a clinic, or in any institute out there, to guarantee that there is a core of skills coming out of the school, or a core of coverage within a health service that is defendable against what happens to the average Australian all over Australia. That core can certainly be kept in place without curtailing the ability of local people to come up with innovative solutions to the business of effective service delivery.
I would expect under these policies as we move through systematically to look each region and what each community wants to do with its service delivery at the NT level, or perhaps at both the NT and the Commonwealth level, that there will be a whole lot of different structures that will come into play. I am sure some groups will want to specialise in one area of service delivery, and other ones might want to do a combination. Some groups might want to set up a one-stop-shop for all types of service delivery. Whatever that is, as long as there is commitment to it in the local area, commitment to the extent that a really strong plan can be drawn together, then there is no reason under our policies why the government cannot cash up that service delivery, go into a service delivery agreement and support the local service delivery in that regard.
Speaking about the chronic disease area, I mentioned earlier that I have had a longstanding interest in how to support the communities regarding the problem of chronic disease. It has quite rightly been identified as being the number one growth area in our health budget for all the wrong reasons. All the antecedents of chronic disease are still out there - substance abuse, the general lifestyle of communities, diet, genetics - of all those probably play a part in the incidence of chronic disease in the Northern Territory, in particular in our remote communities. We need to take urgent action on all fronts, everything from the clinical support of people who have gone into end stage renal failure and advanced stages of diabetes, the former contributed to by the latter. At the same time, we have to look at the antecedents of those diseases and work with the communities in preventative health programs to try to cut the supply of new patients going into these areas of ill health.
My work with the Western Desert Dialysis Appeal over the last couple of years has certainly shown that there are many people around Australia who are interested to help outside the resources of government. I cannot see one earthly reason why, now being in government, that work should cease. The original Western Desert Dialysis Appeal, which was based on Kintore, Kiwirrkurra and Mt Liebig, and Papunya, around that area of the Western Desert, raised $1m and it raised it from the art market from people who were concerned by the plight of end stage renal failure patients, that they were prepared to chuck in big time to the point that a $1m was raised in one day. That money is now being put back through to the Western Desert Appeal implementation process. The WDDA is now run with a project officer, Dr Paul Rivalland, who now answers to a Pintupi Board which consists of seven people drawn from Kiwirrkurra and Kintore. They are his bosses. At the other side of him stands the Friends of the Western Desert Dialysis Appeal which is some 120 people consisting of health professionals, art market dealers, bureaucrats, people from all walks of life who are prepared to not only provide further funding if necessary, but also their own expertise as needed as the project develops.
The money is held under a very strong bookkeeping system and the project is being supported out of the School of Remote Health in Alice Springs. I am very grateful to Dr John Wakerman for offering the sponsorship of his organisation to maintain the development of the Western Desert Dialysis activities. Patients are already having home returns. Every two months, each patient who is currently based in Alice Springs can go back home by charter flight or by bus out of Tangentyere Council to visit their families and sit down for a day or so back home. That has been hugely appreciated and has made a big impact on their morale - and that is by the judgment of the social worker who is working with the patients. We expect that the next stage will be a visit to the Royal Perth Hospital to have a look at the model that is used in the Western Australian remote communities of self-dialysis for most patients, the patients that are certainly physically capable of doing that. Patients are taken to the Royal Perth Hospital for a period of anything up to a year, but usually more like six months, and they are trained in the use of the equipment and then return to their communities under the care of a general nurse with regular contacts with specialists.
So, we have got away from the very expensive model of having specially trained renal nurses and nephrologists having to be available to a dialysis program on a continual basis. The interesting thing is that the patients in the Western Australian program are actually outlasting the average survival rates of patients in places like the Alice Springs dialysis program. So there does not seem any intrinsic reason why patients cannot carry out a lot of their own care under the overall supervision of a general nurse and with specialist input from time to time to make sure things are going okay.
I will finish my contribution to this debate by indicating that the people who drew together the Western Desert Dialysis Appeal are now wanting to move on to yet another appeal aimed at getting recreation facilities into some of the remote communities, particularly swimming pools. They now have teamed up - they are a very versatile mob - the art dealers are wanting to go back to the art market again, and they are claiming that the $1m is the tip of the iceberg and it was just the Sydney art patrons who contributed to that original appeal. They want to now move on to Melbourne as well as Sydney, and they are also have a commitment from the AFL to include in it events that involve Aboriginal footballers from the AFL contributing to fundraising events there. They have set themselves a target of $5m, Mr Deputy Speaker, and if we get $5m from that appeal, that is going to make a huge impact on the Western Desert communities if we can build decent facilities for those communities using these publicly raised funds.
This stuff is inspiring and when you look at the combination of the people who are out there working in our health delivery areas, the fact that this new government has a fresh approach to the way in which service delivery can be offered to those communities, and the goodwill and the effort that is available to people who realise how serious things are out there, we don’t need to be all doom and gloom. There are some great things that are going to be achieved in the next few years and we are going to give it a red hot go.
Mr KIELY (Sanderson): Mr Deputy Speaker, I commend the minister on the points that she brought forward. I will confine my comments now to the government’s plan to tackle illicit drugs. I would like to talk about the human face of the drug problem that we have out in our suburbs, out in the northern suburbs, out in my electorate of Sanderson. During the course of this debate, we have talked about drugs addicts. I have had the feeling when we talk about these people we pass them over as some sort of under class, some sort of people who by nefarious means pick up their drugs and they are always involved in crime and running around terrorising the neighbourhood.
I will tell you a story about when I was door knocking. I went to a house in Anula and in this house there was a single parent with a young boy about 10 years old. The house outside was pretty knocked about. I went in and I knocked at the door and they said, ‘Come in, come in,’ without even asking who I was and I went into the kitchen area of that house. Here was the householder in terrible pain with an agonised look on their face and they said, ‘Sit down’. I was very chuffed by the hospitality they were showing me, but I could see that there was something wrong. I might say the house was a bit unkempt, no more so than a lot of other places that I have been into in my travels. Anyway, I said, ‘Well, what’s wrong here?’ She said, ‘I have run out of my morphine. I have chronic back pain. I am addicted to morphine. However, my house is known to contain this drug and I am constantly being burgled by people because I am an easy hit’. And what had happened was that the night before, the other drug users in the community had come into the house, basically walked through the place.
This house had no security on it. She had been to the housing authority to ask for security devices but they said that this person did not meet the criteria. So these people would come in and basically walk all over this individual, take her drugs and then leave. This individual was then forced to go to her medical practitioner; be prescribed another course of MS Contin and then she had an arrangement with the medical practitioner and with the chemist that she would have to travel from Anula down to, I think it was Hibiscus. There is no public transport, she had to catch a cab, her mobility was severely limited by her bad back and she would have to go down and get the drug and bring it home and then the cycle would continue.
What she asked of me, in assistance, was could I please make representations from her to Territory Housing so that she could get security screens on her bedroom and so that she could make her bedroom secure, so that she could lock herself in there when she was under medication. I wrote to Territory Housing on her behalf and I did receive a response from them and I have no problems with that. She had also asked whether perhaps she could have some assistance to clean up her yard - so the house did not look so badly knocked around- from the Correctional Services people who sometimes went around and did this.
I went back to see how she was getting on. Her young child came to the door and said, ‘Mum’s in there’. I went inside the house and I spoke to her through the doorway to the bedroom to tell her that that no, on this occasion we had been unsuccessful in getting her house upgraded to the security standards that she wanted but that she was on the list. She spoke to me in what I perceived to be a drug-induced state and thanked me for all my efforts. I looked down and I saw this young child who was trying to look after their parent and I looked at the house which was still pretty well unkempt and I left. I walked out of there. That was all I could do.
But, when I look at it, when I look at the cost to society, of what it costs if we do not tackle this problem with drugs, it is enormous. This woman is going to be in a very poor state of health. She is going to have lifestyle issues. You can bet on that. She is addicted. Her story to me was that her addiction came about through her back injury and then an operation or two and then she kept taking her MS Contin and kept on it and she created a form of addiction. There are no treatment facilities or none that she could avail herself of, so she was pretty well hooked up on it. She was getting her drug prescribed to her. There is a cost. There are other drug addicts in the society, in her suburb, who were preying on her. Her child was not looking well fed, looked to have a few social difficulties; there is another cost there. That is a cost that society will be bearing in the future. The point that I am getting to is that after years of inattention to this problem, what we have is a compounding social cost going on, a social cost that we need to address now.
You talked about the past. We have got to this stage now because there was not enough money put in by the previous government to address such social issues as this, to address the issues of education, of family support for the child. We are going to be paying that cost because of the neglect of the previous government for many, many years to come.
What this government is all about is having a look at that and getting in there. We do not look at the buckets of money and say this bucket is for health and this bucket is for corrections and this bucket is for police services. We look at the whole-of-government budget. We have a look at that and we can see savings. We can see future savings for the community if we address the issue. If we can get this kid straight and stop him from getting into some sort of problems later on, then we have a saving in Correctional Services. If we can get mum fixed up, then we are going to have a saving for the health system later on. That is what our plans are all about. You talk about additional costs and extra money, let’s fix up the problem of drugs in our community and let’s look at the flow on and the extra money that that will free up for our other services.
That is what Labor is all about. Labor is not about just throwing money just willy nilly at any old issue. It is about looking at the society as a whole, tackling pieces of society. What we have here is we just cannot take away one small building block that the CLP had put into place which has enmeshed the whole society in a downward spiral. We have to build a framework around the mess that we have now and then when we strengthen that up, then we can really start addressing the whole social issue.
Mrs AAGAARD (Health, Family and Children’s Services): Madam Speaker, I thank all of the members for their very valuable contribution and I would first like to reiterate that this government is very committed to delivering on health and community services for all Territorians. I am just going to pick up on some of the things which members had particularly asked about during their replies.
The member for Drysdale suggested to me, and it was a very good suggestion, that I should be visiting various Aboriginal communities. I would like to remind him that I have only been the minister for 59 days, but in that time I have been to Alice Springs twice and I have also visited the Tiwi Islands. Although I was not born in the Northern Territory, I have visited a number of Aboriginal communities at the request of Aboriginal friends. I do have some reasonable knowledge of Aboriginal communities and issues on Aboriginal communities.
The member for Drysdale also suggested that I should be visiting many non-government and government organisations in the Territory. I am happy to advise that during this short period of time as a minister, I have seen approximately 150 community organisations in that time and I believe there is a list of more than 500 people waiting to see me, and they have all been scheduled for the next few months. So in fact, I will be seeing large numbers of people but it is not physically possible to see everybody at once.
The member also asked me a direct question in relation to people living in the river bed in Alice Springs. This remark was made in the Centralian Advocate by William Tilmouth of the Tangentyere Council. I will have to get back to Mr Tilmouth to find out about the voracity of the statement.
I thank the member for Johnston for his support and also for providing a very accurate picture of the state of Territory health. The member for Johnston is very committed to improved health outcomes in Northern Territory and his expertise and interest will be of great value to me as minister for health. I thank him for his contribution.
The member for Greatorex asked in particular about buprenorphine and various things to do with illicit drugs in the Northern Territory. One of the points of talking about illicit drugs was that we are going to be bringing together a Drug Task Force to look at all of the issues relating to illicit drugs in the Northern Territory. I do not want to make any assumptions about what that task group, and the briefing from the department, will actually say, so it may be that buprenorphine is appropriate. It may be that methadone is appropriate. I will wait until I have been advised by the task force, and consulted with the community, before making any kind of statements like that.
I would like to thank the member for Wanguri for his support, particularly as he has been the opposition spokesperson on health. He has very been helpful in my first few weeks as minister, and I thank him very much for that.
The member for Macdonnell asked particularly about the $10m which the member for Johnston raised in relation to the use of morphine in the Northern Territory. I have been advised that this is actually correct, and I would be happy to provide a detailed response to you on that. It is very complex and I would be happy to provide that for him in writing.
The member for Macdonnell also made comments about the report which the member for Johnston tabled. I have been advised that this report was actually printed in 1999 but it was not actually released until June 2000, and that it was not publicly released. I have been advised that the health community knew nothing about its release, and that is the context in which the member for Johnston was speaking.
Mr Elferink: Well, it is in the public library. I mean, what am I to assume from that?
Mrs AAGAARD: That is my response to that.
I was a bit disappointed that the member for Port Darwin appeared to be blaming the victim in terms of health. Certainly, this government is very committed to putting in place programs which actually help people to take control of their own health, but it is very important that the government is much more active in preventative health. We think that the government plays a very key role in this and we will not be blaming the victim in the future. It was very interesting that the member for Port Darwin also made the connection between the use of illicit drugs and property crime. I certainly agree with her on that one.
I thank the member for Stuart for his comments on matters relating to the Centre, for his support of this statement and for myself as the minister.
I was very interested to hear the member for Sanderson’s comments about illicit drugs in the northern suburbs of Darwin. They are very similar to the sorts of things that I found when I was doorknocking, and I think it is one of the key reasons why having an adequate illicit drug strategy is going to be so important for the Northern Territory. I thank honourable members for their contribution.
Motion agreed to; statement noted.
Mr HENDERSON (Industries and Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly do now adjourn.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Madam Speaker, I rise to make comments in relation to answers from the tourism minister this afternoon. I am expressing some anger at this government’s decision not to positively respond to the Flight West proposal - in other words, not to indemnify it. The minister said, when answering questions this afternoon, that he did not have details of the proposal and that is why government would not support it. This is a very curious thing for him to have said because I am advised that details have, in fact, been provided to government. Detailed cash flows and costings were in fact provided to the Department of Transport some weeks ago. It is curious, is it not, that one government minister does not know what is happening in another government department? Clearly, that is the case.
In addition, at a public meeting in the minister’s own electorate some weeks ago, he said that he would not support the Flight West proposal because it is not a federal government issue. I am told he made it very clear that this government would not provide one cent to support the Flight West proposal. Clearly, the minister is unable to get his head around the fact that the collapse of Ansett has profound effects on the Northern Territory and that it is incumbent upon government, regardless of its political colour, to do all that it can to assist the tourism industry.
On Friday last week, the liquidator of Flight West wrote to the minister specifically asking for his support so that Flight West could be up and running. I am inclined to accept that the minister himself did not or has not read that letter. The fact of the matter is that the liquidator of Flight West is wanting this government to assist Flight West to get up and running. This government consistently refuses to help. The Queensland government recognises the importance of tourism and has offered to indemnify Flight West. The Alice Springs Town Council is supportive, and the federal government has agreed to indemnify $380 000 to assist Flight West. Nabalco has offered to support the airline if it gets up and running. This airline will go to a number of regional centres including the Minister for Tourism’s own electorate of Nhulunbuy.
The proposal is a very good one. In essence, it will carry 90 people per day. The Air North proposal, the one that the government has given money to, only carries 30 people. On the day it will start, Darwin will have connections to southern ports via Brisbane. It will be a daily service out of Darwin to Brisbane which will connect with Ansett services to Sydney and Melbourne. It will also go to Alice Springs and Gove. The attraction of the proposal obviously is that it is not Top End heavy in the same way that the Virgin proposal is. The Flight West proposal is a new and exciting initiative and I urge government to reconsider its position and indemnify the liquidator of Flight West to assist Northern Territory tourism.
This government elects to support Sir Richard Branson over local operators, which is a disgrace. The minister said that he did not have enough information. My response to that is that he has a task force, he has recently created a task force. It is up to the task force to get out and about and to talk to the liquidator. It is not for the ordinary person to try to entice government into a proposal which is widely accepted will assist the Northern Territory tourism industry. It is for government to get on top of these issues. This government should get on to govern. It is not a federal government issue; it is one that this government needs to address. This is a Territory issue and the ramifications of the collapse of Ansett are disastrous, and the Minister for Tourism knows it. The proposal, in a nutshell, has been supported by all and sundry. The only outstanding stakeholder that does not support it is the Northern Territory government. It should be ashamed of itself and it is utterly disgraceful.
Having dealt with that issue, while I am on my feet, I would like to address another issue, again expressing my concern about this government’s decision to sell the Cawood Court units in Alice Springs to a developer. Earlier this year, I lobbied the CLP government to close the Cawood Court units on the basis that cluster housing was an outdated concept, and people living in urban areas did not want to live in such areas or, for that matter, live near them. The units, as you would know, Madam Speaker, are the cause of a significant amount of antisocial behaviour. I spoke with many residents, both nearby as well as those people who lived in the units, and the former government undertook to demolish the units as a result of the input I had to the government based on my discussions with residents. In other words, everybody wanted Cawood Court demolished and the former government undertook to do so.
As I said in my maiden speech, there is a shortage of land in Alice Springs, and the previous government intended to release a portion of the site for first home buyers. The remainder was to be developed as a seniors’ village. These commitments had broad and overwhelming support from the people in the area. The units have been a problem for a long time. The former CLP government listened, responded and undertook a plan of action in relation to their concerns. What is disturbing is that I wrote to the Minister for Central Australia on 26 September and asked him to advise what the government planned to do with the site. The response was a sad one because he simply referred me to the Minister for Lands, Planning and Environment.
During the election campaign, the ALP said that they would dispense with the position of Minister for Central Australia and under great pressure from many people in the Centre they eventually agreed to keep the position. The problem however is that the Minister for Central Australia clearly has no idea what is going on there. If an elected member cannot get some sort of response from the Minister for Central Australia, then I hold out very little hope for the people of Alice Springs when or if they go to him seeking an answer to a fairly straight forward question.
In any event, I am still waiting for the Minister for Lands, Planning and Environment to contact me to advise me of his plans, but I need not wait any longer, as the announcement was made last week to sell the complex to a developer. It is a disgrace because there is a glut of units in Alice Springs and it is widely understood that a developer will simply dress up the units and sell them. The market is already saturated so it makes no sense at all that the government would make the decision it has.
In addition, the shortage of land in Alice Springs is almost at crisis point. It is abundantly clear from the decision and the announcement made last week that this ALP government does not support the release of land in Alice Springs. I really feel for first home buyers in particular. I know myself, not so long ago driving around Alice Springs looking for a block of land, I had heard that there was a shortage of land, but to see it for myself was quite an interesting experience. For young couples who are wanting to build their own homes, there is nowhere, essentially, in Alice Springs to do it.
What troubles me over and above all of the matters I have discussed, is who was consulted by this government when it made the decision to sell these units? This party campaigned heavily on the basis that it would consult, consult, consult. It would workshop endlessly on significant government decisions. But in this instance, I am very sad to say, there does not appear to have been any consultation. I would like the minister to let me know who was consulted, if anybody, and to identify those people and whether they were more than just public servants. One thing is certain: the residents were not consulted. I know because they have been e-mailing, faxing and telephoning my office on a daily basis since this decision was made.
I have, for a few weeks, been telling concerned residents that I was doing all that I could to chase the matter up. But of course, when one is waiting for a response from the Minister for Central Australia, who ultimately comes back and says, ‘I am sorry, you need to deal with another minister’, and then, when no response is forthcoming from that other minister, all I can do is tell my constituents that I am doing as much as I can.
This is a government that has told Territorians that it would consult like never before. It has not consulted apparently, and it is a disgrace. I feel very sad about the future of those in Alice Springs if this demonstrates the sort of consultation - or lack of it - that is to be undertaken by this government. There is, I understand, suggestion that part of the site could be used as a centre for renal dialysis. I will be writing to the Minister for Lands, Planning and Environment and asking him to confirm whether or not this is the case.
In conclusion, the CLP government consulted and responded to community concerns. The new government has not consulted and I am terribly disappointed about that. It has come up with a short-term plan to flog off a whole lot of units in a delightful urban area in Alice Springs. It should be ashamed of itself, and I can assure constituents that I will be vigorously pursuing this issue.
Mrs AAGAARD (Nightcliff): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, it is with sorrow that I note the passing of long-term Territorian, Josef Karlhuber. Joe died last Friday at the age of 74 after a long illness. I met Joe in 1986 and have worked with him on many events over the years. Joe’s contribution to the Northern Territory, and that of his family, has been acknowledged in this Assembly previously by the then Chief Minister, Shane Stone. Joe’s story is one that represents many aspects of the enterprise, determination, involvement and hard work that so typifies Northern Territorians. In the 1940s, Joe was a foot soldier in the German army returning to his native Austria, only after two years as a prisoner of war in Russia.
In 1950, Joe came to Australia under a contract to work for a construction company in Perth. Despite being financially exploited as a new and contracted migrant to Australia, Joe applied for citizenship after 18 months. He then established himself as a photographer at Subiaco, moving to Darwin to pursue his profession in 1958. Jim Bowditch from the Northern Territory News offered him the opportunity to set up the photo section in the newspaper in 1960. I understand that Joe was the first full-time photographer employed by the NT News. It is in that capacity that Joe first became widely known and highly regarded, taking that special action shot at sporting and community events.
In 1967, Joe married his wife, Lyn Bleakley, who was originally from Perth. Over time, a number of Lyn’s family members also joined their sister in Darwin, establishing well-known businesses here. In 1971, Joe bought out the well-known photographic business of Lillian Dean. He returned following Cyclone Tracy to rebuild after the business, personal papers, photographs and memorabilia were devastated. In the immediate aftermath of the cyclone, Joe was hired by the Housing Commission to photograph damage caused to Housing Commission houses, recording for posterity the physical impact of that event. Joe was a strong supporter of self-government for the Territory and independence from southern states. This was demonstrated when he introduced colour film processing to the Northern Territory so that film no longer needed to be shipped to Adelaide.
Joe and Lyn have lived in Nightcliff for many years. They have worked with a number of community groups in Darwin including Apex and Rotary. They are foundation members of the German Club and the Edelweiss Shooting Club. Joe especially enjoyed the outdoor life and the occasional fishing trip. I convey my sympathy and that of the Assembly to Lyn, their children, Monica, Manfred, Trevor, Philip, and grandchildren. We will miss him.
Mr MALEY (Goyder): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, I wish to draw honourable members’ attention to a great rural institution, a rural icon that represents all the best qualities of the people of the electorate of Goyder. I am talking, of course, about the mighty Litchfield Bears Rugby League Club. I am proud to say I have had a long involvement with the club, from Under 6s up until recent times, playing in the reserve grade grand final in the early 1990s. Indeed, it is an honour to be the first Litchfield Bear in parliament and I am very proud of that fact. It is something which the club has also taken a great deal of pride in.
The Litchfield Bears Rugby League Club is more than just a club. It is a family. The club and the game of rugby league really produces and instils all the right qualities in our citizens of tomorrow. There is a real team spirit, a real club spirit, and a real community spirit. It has been a big year for the Bears. The season came to an end only recently. The Litchfield Bears did all right. The Under 17s took the premiership flag. Indeed, they received their jumpers at a recent presentation night. The reserve grade, the heart and soul of the club, which includes legends like Mark (Fitzy) Fitzgerald and Luke Marshall and many others, who really are the salt of the earth rural people, an asset to our community. They just missed out on the grand final. It was a huge effort and certainly one they should be proud of.
The A grade side did not fare as well. They, unfortunately, did not get into the grand final. But they are keeping their dream alive; there is next year. There was a huge effort by people like Paul Rubie, who was the coach, and the captain of the A grade side, Mark Buckley. I am reminded of the words of motivational speaker, Dr Ted Tedford, who came up at the beginning of the year from the Institute of Sport. He gave a talk to the club, to the supporters, to the team members, and as he quite properly said, ‘Keep the dream alive’ and that is what it is all about. Unfortuantely, it is sad to note that Dr Tedford has developed a problem with kava abuse. He is dealing with that and hopefully he will be back to give us some sort of motivational talk again early next year.
While the Bears are in hibernation over the Wet Season, over the off season, the numerous rugby league widows will get their men back at least until early next year. The engine room of the club however is of course the juniors, the Little Bears and the Bearettes. Indeed, there are two or three sides of Little Bears in some of the junior grades and there is no doubt that the future of the Litchfield Bears Rugby League Club and indeed certainly the senior sides is embodied in the junior competition, the Bearettes and the Bears which currently play.
The club has a strong committee, and president in John Bell. The balance of the committee are all volunteers, all people who work hard, who give up countless hours during the week and on the weekends to help rural people. There are people like Tuppy and Bobby who work behind the bar and people like Jeff Rees who constantly chase sponsors, all do a fantastic job.
I thank members for listening to my words and I wholeheartedly support and commend the Litchfield Bears and the qualities that they represent to all members of the Chamber. The catch-cry of the Litchfield Bears is, of course: Go, you Bears!
There is one other matter that I would like to draw to members’ attention. Some of my colleagues in this Chamber may not be aware that the electorate of Goyder really varies as much as its demographics. It is some 52 000 km. It covers an enormous portion of land and I am blest to represent the people who live there. There are many different areas. One of the areas that I would like to draw members’ attention to is the Dundee region. Dundee is one of the jewels of the electorate of Goyder. Whilst there are only approximately 150 or so people on the Electoral Roll, the numbers swell each weekend to about 1500. Indeed, there are many people who live in the northern suburbs and other portions of the electorate of Goyder and Nelson who own blocks out there and frequently travel out with their friends and family for fishing and outdoor excursions.
There is a real sense of anticipation and expectation. There is a rock solid promise that the people of Dundee have; it is in writing. It is a real commitment that in this term of government, they will received their tar road and their power. They are looking forward to that and I am very pleased to hear that those promises have been reaffirmed in this Chamber in a very general way during the course of the first sittings of this parliament. The work, however, does not stop there. There are other issues that need to be addressed in the Dundee region – and I am not going to go through them in an exhaustive fashion - but issues like the water problem needs to be addressed. I suspect that at the end of the day there will need to be some real planning about doing the work to articulate town water, mains water into the Dundee region. There is a Dundee Progress Association which has been up and running for a number of years. They are a dedicated group of locals who have done a lot of work and have the interests of Dundee close to their heart, people like George Puls, the former and most recent past president and the current president, Ian Stewart and the balance of the committee do a fantastic job in their work and dedication to the area should be commended.
Dundee and the development of the infrastructure which I have touched upon is a priority and should remain a priority for the government. I will certainly continue to fight hard for the people of the Dundee and Bynoe Haven regions to ensure that the facilities they so properly deserve are eventually made available to them.
Another important area of the electorate of Goyder is that of Cox Peninsula or Wagait Beach. Wagait Beach is probably one of Darwin’s best kept secrets. It is no wonder that there are several long-time Darwin identities living there, people like Darwin legend, Stem Edwards. Everyone knows Stem; everyone likes him. He is the type of bloke who has made a huge contribution to the social fabric of the Northern Territory and Darwin. He is certainly a character and a well-known identity in the Wagait community.
The Cox Peninsula Community Government Council also do a fantastic job. There is a real sense of community there. That was evident recently when I attended the Federation Day celebrations at Wagait Beach. There is little doubt that the amount of effort that local people put into those celebrations was an example for the rest of the people in the Northern Territory. They received some support from government in terms of funding and also they, of course, received some funding from their local council and, coupled with the contributions in time and effort, they were able to put on a fantastic event.
There are several matters which must still be addressed if the Wagait Beach area is to develop even further and one of those is water. Currently, the spring water runs dangerously low towards the end of the Dry and water has to be carted in from Darwin River. This needs to be addressed for Wagait to really take the next step in its developmental road. Also, the last 22km of the Cox Peninsula Road need to be sealed to ensure all year round access and a safer road. There are too many accidents on that road. I look forward to a commitment from government in the November mini-budget that before some of the competing priorities like $60m to bury power lines in the northern suburbs are given the go ahead, that these priorities, such as the ones that I have articulated for Wagait Beach, are seriously considered and dealt with. I am asking members of this Chamber to get behind the good people of Cox Peninsula and Wagait Beach.
I am indebted to Stem Edwards for his advice and his assistance in bringing this issue to a head: that is the construction of a boat ramp beside the existing wharf. There were initially plans for just a single lane boat ramp. After talking to Stem, who is an esteemed fisherman and keen boat person, he quite properly pointed out that it needs to be a double lane boat ramp, and I understand that the plans are well and truly in train to build that boat ramp. It would assist transport difficulties and the loading and unloading of boat difficulties which people who live at Wagait Beach, Belyuen and the Cox Peninsula area endure at the moment.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, I note the two seconds that the member for Goyder spoke for, that he told me about. I would like to make comment tonight about two forums that I spoke at recently, both extremely interesting and both quite different. I spoke at the Christian Schools Association National Forum in Alice Springs. Jack Mechielsen, who is the Chief Executive Officer in Darwin, invited me along to address the delegates who came from all around Australia. As you are probably aware, the growth of the Christian Schools Association in the Territory has been quite remarkable in a short time. There are now six of them: one in Alice Springs, which is Araluen; then we have Litchfield, Marrara, Nhulunbuy, the Northern Territory Christian College and the Palmerston Christian School.
The Northern Territory government has always been very supportive of the growth of the private system in the Northern Territory. It has been a productive policy because we have had a growth of independent schools and the diversity of what they offer gives parents a choice of education for their children. There is no doubt in my mind the capital assistance grants that the previous government had implemented was most generous and enabled independent schools to grow and construct facilities with some degree of security. We all acknowledge the cost of building in the Territory is very high so there needs to be some incentives to get the private sector into the Territory. You need to understand that private school systems in the Northern Territory are not very old. In other states, private schools have been there for generations and as they have been developed, beneficiaries have contributed, the buildings and facilities have grown, so, of course, they have become quite wealthy. But, in the Northern Territory, funding by the government is critical, and I believe the review that started so long ago is not completed. I know there are many schools out there waiting to see what will happen as a result of the new Cabinet when they consider that review.
I understand that the main thrust these days, with money being tight, is that private schools and government schools should have good management and business planning. There is a need, though, to work together more cooperatively. Government and non-government schools need to make sure they plan together so there is not duplication or over supply by either party in the education arena. Of course, the challenge for this government will be in dispersing future funding to cover enrolment growth, not perhaps the enrolment shift that we have seen. Alice Springs’ population has not grown for some time and what has happened is that there are shifts in enrolment from school to school as a new principal comes in and gets established and shows strong leadership. What we do not need is duplication of facilities. What we do need is the maintenance of a good public school system, but also a choice of non-government schools which want to offer an alternative education.
Talking to this conference, these people were very aware of how money these days is tight, and how they would need to justify when they were going to build a new facility, that it was, in fact, needed. As the Territory population has grown so quickly, particularly up here in Darwin and Palmerston, we have seen this need for new schools. It is important that these schools can establish themselves so parents have a choice. They also need to show good leadership and perhaps a little bit of an entrepreneurial approach, to make sure they offer something special to parents out there to capture some of the market. It is not a simple thing these days to establish a new school. There are many pressures put on schools and I would hope that this pressure would not detract from the primary purpose of the school, that they would not end up with gimmicks, that they would be offering a good education. This group of Christian school CEOs, from my perspective, do have quite an important part to play in offering that different choice to parents within our community. Certainly the values they espouse, the community values, the values of respect and right and wrong, are the kind of values that we can all understand and appreciate.
I also talked to them about the need to look at curriculum and prioritising. We talked before about the overload of the curriculum at the moment and how schools really need to, in a way, cull and determine what exactly they want to teach. I am a proponent of back to basics and believe basic skills are important if you are going to go on with education for the rest of your life. I see that these schools have a strong commitment also to teaching children the basics so they will have the skills for future learning. I have to admit that I sometimes despair of the Australian education system that slavishly follows overseas trends, often after they have been proved unsuccessful. We have a push at the moment in the system for frameworks and I just wondered after a huge amount of time schools gave to profiles, what next will come up.
When you talk to people like this who are so dedicated, when you know there are parents out there willing to pay extra for a special education, you have to admire the fact that they are willing to go into a community and start afresh. You have to admire teachers today for taking on the task of teaching, it is not simple; and principals have to show good leadership. I commend the Christian Schools Association for the work they are doing within our communities. I know the conference was a great success. People there were very much won over by the Centre, and showed significant interest in the Northern Territory. I thank Jack Mechielsen for his invitation.
The other conference that I attended and opened was quite different. It was called ALSO. ALSO stands for Advanced Life Support in Obstetrics. Anything we can do to make a birth for a mother or a baby safer has to be a very good thing. Early this year, Helen Baldwin, who is the Maternal and Infant Health Educator in the Alice Springs and Central region, was invited to take part in the inaugural Australian Advanced Life Support in Obstetrics course in Canberra. There were 24 specially invited obstetricians, midwives, general practitioners and neo-natalologists who undertook and passed that course. This course is not a simple course; it is a very difficult course. There is a written exam at the end of it. They are quite selective in who they offer it to, and then they select people they can train to be instructors. This of course was a first for the Territory having it in Alice Springs. There were approximately 58 participants who gave up their weekend to attend the course. The people who are the instructors do it free of charge, that is, their travel and accommodation is cared for but they charge nothing for the work they do. You have to admire, very much, that they are willing to do that travel around Australia. From that course in Alice Springs, we hope there will be a bank of people who will then be instructors and then it will be finally offered in Darwin, and so the work will grow.
I went around the different workstations that they had. It is so intensive that often it is just one lecturer to four people, working through a particular element of that course in safe delivery. The course itself could be applied to so many instances in the Territory. There are so many opportunities for us to have these people trained in emergency birth situations, and basically the course is there to ensure people do not panic, that they know a simple procedure to go through to make sure the birth at the end of the day, is successful. With our statistics in mortalities and what-have-you, this can only but help and assist.
I was impressed at the number of people at the course, but also the diverse range. There were specialist nurses, midwives, you name it, and all these people had come together at the weekend to participate. It is an interesting course. It was originated in the United States in 1991, and it has been adapted to suit the needs of thousands of practitioners around the world in such countries as the United Kingdom, Canada, Brazil, Germany, Belgium and Nepal. Australia has come in a bit later but they are endeavouring to build up this bank of instructors. Some of the instructors who were there came from America and New Zealand. If we eventually have our bank of instructors within Australia, they will be able to offer it at many places.
I just thought it was a great initiative and I commend Professor Jed Williams. Jed is the Executive Director of Nursing in the Alice Springs Hospital and it was his initiative that enabled this course to come together and he obtained the funding through the Commonwealth. It was quite an expensive course. The registration fees are over $800. So it is a credit to Jed that he has been able to do this. I must commend Helen Baldwin also, who did that course originally and has come back so enthusiastic so that people in the Territory can benefit from this particular course. At the end of the day, we hope the benefits will be for the mothers and babies and we will see safe deliveries.
Ms MARTIN (Fannie Bay): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, as the Minister for Senior Territorians and member for Fannie Bay, I rise to pay tribute tonight to a woman who, until her death a few weeks ago, was perhaps our most senior Territorian, and certainly one of our most tenacious, optimistic and inspiring Territory pioneers. She was Eileen Marjorie Fitzer, whose remarkable life spanned a century and who died on 27 August, just seven months short of her 100th birthday. I was privileged to have had Eileen as my constituent and was always uplifted and inspired by my visits to her at her unit in Kurringal Flats, and more recently at the Salvation Army Nursing Home.
Ever alert and smiling, despite being quite physically restricted in recent years, she would say, ‘I’m never lonely; I live on my memories’, and what amazing memories they were. I would like to take a few moments this evening to place on the public record my personal appreciation, and I am sure that of most Territorians, for the very substantial contribution Eileen Fitzer made to the Territory throughout the last century. Eileen played many roles during her lifetime: entertainer, political activist, pioneer nurse, policeman’s wife and partner, remote outback hostess, faithful friend and mentor.
Conceived as Australia was forming itself as a nation, Eileen was born in Darwin on 30 March 1902, to Eleanor and Tom Styles. She was extremely proud of her pioneering stock, her Darwin-born mother was the daughter of Ned and Eliza Tuckwell, who are among the Territory’s earliest European settlers, and from whom Eileen inherited her strong spirit. Ned, who had been part of the South Australian expedition to establish a settlement at Escape Cliffs from 1864 to 1866, arrived in Darwin with George Goyder’s South Australian survey party in 1868.
Eliza, a Cockney who had immigrated to Adelaide as a servant girl in 1855, arrived with their four children on the first ship to carry passengers to the Territory in January 1870. To help pay the bills, Eliza took in washing and acted as a midwife, while Ned worked on most of the city’s early buildings, including the first Government Residence. Eileen’s mother, Eleanor, was born at the camp in Darwin in 1873, and spent her childhood and teenage years here. In 1893, at the age of 19, she married English-born Tom Styles, and moved with him to Brock’s Creek, where he was the underground manager for the Zapopan mine.
By the time Eileen arrived on the scene, her mother had given birth to five children, three of whom died in infancy. Following Eileen’s birth, Eleanor had another son, who also died as an infant, and another daughter. Eileen was proud of the fact that her grandmother and her mother were among the first Australian women to vote after South Australia passed the necessary legislation in 1894, and she would have been pleased to see the percentage of women in parliament increase substantially in the last Territory election. She spoke enthusiastically and vividly of the rich cultural life she experienced with her family, of travelling through the exotic Chinatown on the edge of Brock’s Creek, and of days filled with singing and dancing, led by her father’s rich voice and her mother’s lively concertina playing. She remembered an early birthday the community gave for her, when guests danced on antbed and ash floors, and of the following morning when Eileen and her sisters had to sweep up all the dust.
School was in a tiny house at Brock’s Creek, where the five students had a tin whistle band. Sometimes Eileen and her musical sister, Myrtle, used to entertain the others by putting dusters on their heads and signing Two Little Girls in Blue. When Eileen was eight, her mother died of cancer, and Eileen and her sister, Gertrude, were sent to the Darwin convent school where Eileen earned top marks and became an accomplished seamstress. Her other two sisters, Lillian and Myrtle, lived with their grandmother who had run a boarding house called Resolution Villa ever since her husband’s death in 1882.
A staunch Methodist, Eliza lived across the street from the historic Wesleyan Church, which she attended regularly. Eileen had vivid memories of her grandmother as a little lady always wearing a black bonnet and shawl, sitting in a rocker on the veranda and singing hymns in the latter years of her life. She also recalled the adventure of being a child in Darwin, of playing cowboys and indians down at Fort Hill and exploring Chinatown, then in the heart of Cavenagh Street. Eileen described it as the most fabulous place in the world and the Chinese New Year celebration as the most exciting time in a European child’s life.
During the First World War, in which her brother, Walter, died on the battlefields of France, Eileen and her sisters moved to Pine Creek to be with their father who, Eileen claimed, probably greased every nut and bolt on the Pine Creek railway. When Eileen finished school at the age of 12, as there was no further schooling available in Pine Creek, she took a job as a nursemaid at 10 shillings a week. She remembered her devastation when the family got a letter from the Army informing them that her brother had been killed on the battlefields of France, the first Territory boy to die in the war. The letter from the Army said he was engaged on a mission when, without warning, a machine gun opened fire and he was hit in two places. They said he was most heroic in the manner in which he bore great pain and was an example to many a hardened soldier.
After the war, the girls moved to a bachelor pad in Darwin where they were extremely popular and active in all areas of the community and served on the ANZAC Day committee when the community constructed a monument to the Territory boys who had lost their lives in the war. Eileen got a job as a salesgirl at the large European shop of Jolly’s and earned herself a reputation as an entertainer of note. After one of her performances, the local paper said that, ‘If Miss Eileen Styles went to America, she would be snapped up by an enterprising picture film man’.
Eileen, who used to described herself as a bit of a rebel and game for anything, became a political activist when she was 19. In 1921, Eileen, who had grown up in a strong Labor household, brought roast dinners to leading citizens who went to gaol in a successful ‘no taxation without representation’ fight. Then she drove a sulky all over Darwin campaigning for one of those citizens, union and Labor leader Harold Nelson, who became the Territory’s first member of federal parliament in 1922. Eileen carried on the tradition and remained a staunch supporter of Labor all her life. It was very rewarding and satisfying to me personally, as her local member, that she lived just long enough to see Labor finally win government for the first time in the Territory.
Eileen’s political interests eventually took second place to the profession she chose to follow. In 1927, Eileen’s sister, Gertrude, financed her to do a nursing course in Melbourne where she initially had problems with her feet because she wasn’t used to walking on the pavement. After nursing school, she did midwifery at the Queen Victoria. The week she got her successful results, she caught the train to Alice Springs, so anxious was she to return to the Territory. At Alice Springs, she carried out pioneer work at The Bungalow, working with Stolen Generation children suffering from eye disease. In 1934, she was transferred to Pine Creek as Sister-in-Charge of the hospital where she said most of her cases were caused by mining accidents or pub fights. She was visited at least once a week by the famous flying doctor, Clyde Fenton, who was stationed in Katherine. A practical joker as well as an amazing pilot, Fenton often involved Eileen in his flying stunts.
In 1936, Eileen married a long time friend, World War I veteran Harry Gribbons whom she affectionately referred to as her ‘wild Irishman’. In late 1938, they went to the Wauchope wolfram mining fields near Tennant Creek. For the next 18 months, Eileen was the only European woman on the fields and was often called on to nurse sick miners, mostly with eye problems. Here she lived in what she whimsically referred to as ‘The Mansion’, which was in reality a tiny shed with the floor made of shavings and filings from the mine. She always wore a pith helmet with a fly veil on it and served meals under a large mosquito net to keep the flies off.
Eileen was next asked to relieve the nursing sister at Channel Island leprosarium for a few months where she looked after about 120 lepers. This was followed by another job as the Matron at the then new Bagot Aboriginal compound in Darwin. Some time later, she and Harry bought the Adelaide River Hotel which they ran until late 1941 when Harry became extremely ill and they were evacuated to Sydney on the USS Grant with about 250 women and children. Once Eileen got her husband settled in Sydney, she successfully sought permission to return to Adelaide River to settle up the business affairs. She caught the train to Alice Springs and then travelled in a truck convoy to Adelaide River where she was the only civilian woman.
After handing over her hotel furniture to the nurses, Eileen returned to Sydney where she remained with her husband until he died in early 1943. A short time later, she got a telegram from the Byrne family at Tipperary Station inviting her to come and live with them as a nurse. She jumped at the chance to return to the Territory. It was while she was there that Eileen renewed her friendship with one of the Territory’s most famous policemen, Tas Fitzer, then the Officer In Charge of the Daly River police station. A romance blossomed and in April 1945, Tas and Eileen were married at Tipperary Station in a ceremony which lasted for three days.
After the wedding the couple moved to their home on the Daly River where Tas was stationed as a policeman. Eileen soon became known as the ‘white queen of the Daly’ and she was hostess to many of the military serving in the area. She made headlines across Australia when she became desperately ill one Wet Season and was dramatically rescued by a boom defence vessel which battled raging floods to bring Father Frank Flynn to her aid.
Eileen’s famous good nature and generosity continued later at Timber Creek, where the couple served until 1955 when Tas retired and they moved to Sydney for health reasons. When Tas died in 1966, Eileen returned to her beloved Territory where she lived for many years at Kurringal Flats, making several extended trips overseas. On one visit she had tea at Buckingham Palace after receiving an MBE for her services to nursing and the community.
Earlier this year, she moved to the Salvation Army Nursing Home where she got a renewed lease of life and was fond of telling visitors that she was still fighting fit. In her typical spirited style, Eileen began planning for her historic exit more than 20 years ago when she sought and received permission from the Darwin City Council to be buried in the Goyder Road Cemetery with her grandfather Ned Tuckwell who died in 1882, her mother Eleanor Styles who died in 1910, and her grandmother who died in 1921. When the cemetery was placed on the NT Heritage Register in 1997, the then 95-year-old made sure she had the permission of the Lands, Planning and Environment Minister for her family to carry out her last wishes of being buried with her pioneering family.
She left instructions that when she died she wanted people to celebrate, not mourn, her life. She often used to say, ‘I have had a wonderful life and I have no regrets. I want people to be happy’. Dutifully, on 3 September, a host of family and friends attended Eileen’s funeral mass at St Mary’s Catholic Cathedral, followed by her special burial at the old cemetery which was reopened for the occasion, and later a wake at the Sailing Club, celebrating that lucky life.
While we record our regret at the passing of her remarkable life, we can be grateful that her life story has been richly recorded in oral histories, books, and many feature articles. It is indeed fitting that a few weeks before her death, Eileen was guest of honour at a special function at the Museum and Art Gallery, which had been featuring the small but significant exhibition called Threads of History. It was a display of four delicate embroidered linen signature cloths created by women in the Top End between 1901 and 1940, including two made by Eileen in 1913 and 1923, the latter being the occasion of her 21st birthday.
It is worth repeating what the Northern Territory newspaper said about Eileen at the time, and I quote from the 7 April 1923 edition:
That pride still holds true today, nearly 80 years later. Ironically, Eileen died the day the exhibit was dismantled. There is no doubt that her family’s very significant threads of history will live on in the fifth generation Territory-born descendants of the pioneering Tuckwell family such as the Rixons, the Lovegroves, the Fawcetts and the Eastons, and in the memories of the hundreds of people whose life Eileen Fitzer touched.
So, from this parliament, we say, ‘Vale, Eileen’. May we all learn from your rich and rewarding life and your ever-optimistic and inspiring spirit. May your life and spirit serve to remind us of the very substantial resource our senior citizens are in building this better Territory.
I would like to give my thanks to historian, Barbara James, for that history. She has recorded a lot of the history of some of our pioneers, and certainly recorded Eileen’s with a great passion. My thanks to Barbara, and farewell to Eileen.
Mr VATSKALIS (Casuarina): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, I rise to speak in this adjournment on a number of issues. First of all, I would like to say that a few days ago I attended a barbecue organised by the Islamic Society in Darwin, at which you were present as well together with a number of other parliamentary colleagues. It was a fantastic evening. More than 400 people attended the barbecue, and that showed the rest of the nation how people of different origin and different creed can be together and stand next to each other in harmony in Darwin.
Christians, Buddhists and Muslims stood together, united in their condemnation of terrorism and also united and supporting each other. I am very pleased to announce that the Territory community was very wise and very mature in not taking any action against our Muslim brothers in contrast to what happened in other states in Australia - notably in Queensland where a mosque was fire-bombed. We had some unfortunate incidents, of course, but this was counteracted by equally generous gestures from the community when flowers were placed at the front door of the mosque and phone calls of support were received by the President of the Islamic Society.
After all, people of Muslim faith have been with us for a long number of years. I was in Port Hedland a few years back, and travelling between Port Hedland and Broome I found a number of date palms standing in the middle of the desert. Going back and looking at the history I found out that Afghan camel drivers, or caravan drivers, used to stay by that spring and they used to eat dates. Of course, the date seeds fell on the ground and sprouted and you have a number of date palms in the middle of the desert, something you do not see anywhere else in Australia. I also had the pleasure to work with a person whose name is William Mohammed Ah Mat. He is an Aboriginal Territorian with an English first name and Muslim second name and he is quite proud to say that his origin is from the Afghan camel drivers. We have the train that is named after the camel drivers, the Ghan in Alice Springs. I have to say that the contribution of these Muslim Afghanis during the development of the Territory was significant.
They share the same history with us, the same history with Territorians of Greek, Italian and Chinese descent, who have made the Territory their home. I associated closely with people of Islamic faith in my previous life in the public service, and nothing mattered. It did not matter what faith they were, where they were coming from. What really mattered was how well they could do the job, and I respected them for their efforts and I respected them for the way they keep the traditions and the way they look after their families and bring up their children.
I congratulate the Islamic Society for this barbecue. It was a fantastic evening and I congratulate all Territorians and the people of Darwin who attended that barbecue that night.
On the same matter of multiculturalism, I want to speak about another function - if I can call it that - an official opening of the BP Minimart and Dick Smith electrical store in my electorate in Casuarina. There is nothing important about opening a new petrol station and a new electrical store. What is important is the people behind this development, Mr Theo and Mr Chris Voudouris. I am honoured to call Mr Voudouris my friend; both the Voudouris, the senior and junior are my friends. It is a typical story of people who came from the other side of the world penniless and they made a good life in Australia, and they give something back to the community. Theodore Voudouris’ family, especially his father, Chris, who was a barber in Alexandria, Egypt - one of the oldest Greek communities in the world. He was a very well respected member of the Alexandria Greek community and the Egyptian community. He was so well respected that Theo told me recently, when he went to Alexandria a few years back, he found that the barber shop still stood there and the Egyptian barber who knew his father and was a good friend of his father, had kept the electricity bills under his father’s name, under Chris Voudouris’ name, because he did not want to change the name of the barber shop. It was a very interesting story to hear, and Theo was very, very moved by this sign of kindness by the Egyptian barber.
They arrived in Australia about 50 years ago. Theo went to school, was educated, his father got involved with business and Theo joined the public service. He married Fotini and, according to Theo, he made a very wise decision soon afterwards - he filed for divorce. He filed for divorce from the public service and he decided to go alone into business. With his wife, Fotini, and a very young family, they purchased their first business which was a small minimart in Canberra. Soon they acquired the competitors minimart in the same area and the rest is history.
Just before the cyclone, Theo was looking around Australia for places to invest the money he made in Canberra and he recognised Darwin as a place for opportunity. He came here, he brought his wife and the children here and they decided to invest their fortunes in the Territory. And of course, that decision paid back. Theo has many investments in other states in Australia but the majority of his investments are in the Territory. Theo has a very original idea. He will not start from scratch developing places but instead he will redevelop existing properties and he will develop them in a way that complement the environment and complement the area and will become user friendly so people can find them very easily, can utilise them very easily and also can benefit by it. The present remodelling and the redevelopment of the BP Minimart is an indication of Theo’s ingenuity.
Theo is not a person who - how can I put it? - does things the easy way. When his son, Chris, grew up and he decided to go into business, Theo put him in his business, but at the bottom. Chris, his son, had to work his way through every level in his business and now he is a partner with this father. Equal partner is Theo’s wife, Fotini. They have always worked together, and she has been great support for Theo and for their son, Chris.
As I said before, Theo’s story is a typical story of the migrant who came to Australia, made Australia their home and they have benefited Australia and, at the same time, have enriched Australia with their culture and their dedication and, of course, the progress and advancement they made here. I was very pleased to be at the opening and I was very pleased to see the Voudouris family feeling very proud of what they achieved.
Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, as a member of Greek community, I am also proud of the achievement a fellow Greek Australian has made here in the Territory.
Motion agreed to; the Assembly adjourned.
MINISTERIAL REPORTS
Economic Development Summit
Economic Development Summit
Ms MARTIN (Chief Minister): Madam Speaker, all Territorians will have the opportunity to contribute to my government’s November Economic Development Summit through community forums, an interactive website, and written and oral submissions. As honourable members would know, the summit will be held from Sunday, 4 to Tuesday, 6 November at Parliament House.
To ensure that all Territorians have an opportunity to have their say about the Territory’s future, the summit will be preceded by community forums in Darwin, Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, Katherine and Nhulunbuy this Sunday, 28 October. Ideas canvassed at the forum will then be presented at the summit. The summit will be co-chaired by Territory businessman, Neville Walker and former Territory senator, Bob Collins. I have invited more than 100 participants from industry, business and community groups, including representatives from local government, indigenous and ethnic groups, rural and regional organisations, and unions.
The summit will be structured to generate key recommendations for the November mini-budget and my government’s long term economic development strategy. It will also play a pivotal role in shaping programs for the Business Round Table and the Office of Territory Development.
Madam Speaker, I am determined to restore Territory business and community confidence. The world, Australia and the Territory are facing economic and social challenges. I believe that all Territorians have a role to play in our future prosperity, that is why we are establishing an inclusive process for the summit. The Department of Industries and Business will coordinate the community forums with Regional Economic Development Committee, business, industry and community representation. We will ensure that the issues raised at those forums feed directly into the summit proceedings. In the same way, website, written and oral submissions will also be collated and considered.
Guest speakers at the summit include the Director of the National Institute for Economic and Industry Research, Dr Peter Brain; Futures Specialist, Dr Peter Ellyard; the Chairman of the New South Wales Premier’s Council on the Cost and Quality of Government, Economist Professor Percy Allan; the Chairman of Indigenous Business Australia, Joseph Elu; and former Territorian and now Research Fellow at the Institute for Rural Futures, Dr Judith McNeill. Background papers and forum outcomes will be posted on the website prior to the summit.
I expect a wide range of submissions from summit participants, which will identify options for the Territory’s future. The summit website, which is now operational, is www.econsummit.nt.gov.au. The 1800 number for people to contact for further details on the summit or to submit their ideas is 1800 000 971.
My colleague, the Minister for Industries and Business, Paul Henderson, is chair of the organising committee for the summit and I encourage all members to get involved and talk to us about this very important event for the Territory.
Mango Sea Freight Trial
Mr AH KIT (Transport and Infrastructure Development): Madam Speaker, this morning I had the honour to launch a trial of the transport of Territory mangoes to the large market of Hong Kong. This was done in conjunction with my colleague, the Minister for Primary Industry and Fisheries. This trial is in fact a cooperative effort between the mango industry, the Territory government, Western Australia and the Commonwealth. I applaud this cooperative effort between the industry and government in seizing opportunities to develop new and expanded markets for Territory produce.
The successful export of mangoes by sea freight would provide a great boost to the industry. It would open up access to very large markets and in large volumes. The sorts of volumes that can be secured using sea freight are substantially more than can be serviced by air freight. The mango sea freight trial builds on the innovations of Territorians to become key players in the supply, service and distribution chains in our region. The Logistics Branch of the Department of Transport and Works is providing local produce exporters with hands-on assistance to open new markets and test distribution channels and handling capabilities. The Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries is also providing expert advice to exporters on the life cycles of specific products, the best times to harvest and how best to transport the goods. This joint assistance includes working with freighters to determine optimal transport methods at every point prior to and along the chain. In recent months, assistance has been provided in monitoring trials of live mud crab exports by air to new markets in Taiwan and the United States. Export of cut flowers by air freight to Brunei has also been evaluated.
Today saw the commencement of a carefully monitored trial shipment of two freight containers packed with 18 pallets of Territory mangoes. The mangoes will be shipped to Hong Kong using modified atmosphere technology. The oxygen content of the controlled atmosphere is reduced by injection of nitrogen. Modified atmosphere technology is a key element in this trial. It controls the ripening process extending the shelf life and therefore the competitiveness of the mangoes when delivered to the destination market. The containers will be transhipped through Singapore and total shipping time to Hong Kong is expected to be between 12 and 15 days. This is a fairly standard distribution process for Asian sea freight. The requirement to tranship through Singapore emphasises the importance of the modified atmosphere technology in marketing perishable product such as mangoes.
Representatives from the Northern Territory mango industry and the Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries will be on hand to evaluate the product when it arrives in Hong Kong.
This trial is the result of months of collaboration between mango growers, packaging suppliers, marketing agents, shipping lines, the technology providers and the three governments involved in this trial. In the lead-up to the trial, growers have implemented a strict disease management regime; packing manufacturers have developed appropriate packaging; and overseas customers have been actively consulted and involved. The trial is jointly funded by the Department of Transport and Works, the Western Australian Sea Freight Council and the Commonwealth Department of Transport and Regional Services.
I take this opportunity to congratulate all involved in the project. I know that the trial to date has provided a good opportunity for building communication and cooperative efforts across industries and government. Beyond this trial, I trust that the continuing development of these relationships will result in great developments for the Territory.
Threat of Bioterrorism
Mrs AAGAARD (Health, Family and Children’s Services): Madam Speaker, I rise to report to the Assembly on something that I am sure we all wish was not necessary, and that is our experience of and response to the threat of bioterrorism. While my colleague, the Minister for Police, Fire and Emergency Services has lead responsibilities on this issue, Territory Health Services has a major role to play.
In response to events in the USA, Territory Health Services personnel have been engaged in a number of national and local activities. A Chemical, Biological and Radiation Disaster Management Committee has been formed comprising Northern Territory Hospital administrators, microbiologists, infectious disease physicians, emergency medicine physicians and disease control staff, to review protocols and procedures.
A meeting was held on 12 October specifically around suspect materials presented to Northern Territory police. On 15 October, the Chief Executive Officer, Chief Health Officer and an expert microbiologist met with the Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner of Police to review procedures for handling any suspicious items. The police subsequently issued a media release providing advice to the public on handling any items of concern. You may have seen advertisements in the weekend papers advising the public about cautionary measures in opening mail. A 1800 number has now been established for any queries and to provide advice. This number is 1800 555 740.
So far, three letters and a package at Darwin Airport have raised concern, and were handled according to procedure. On inspection they were found not to be a threat. I can assure members and the public that there is ongoing communication between Territory Health Services and Police and Emergency Services to ensure a well-coordinated and informed response.
At a national level, Australia has had precautionary measures in place for a number of years, and the health system’s level of preparedness was greatly increased as part of the lead-up to the 2000 Olympics. Territory Health Services’ disease control staff have participated in daily teleconferences with the Communicable Disease Network Australia, the Public Health Laboratory Network and the Acting Commonwealth Chief Health Officer, Professor John Mathews, to share information on any events or emerging issues, and to discuss approaches.
Priority has been given to ensuring that accurate and consistent information is provided to the public, including general disease information and handling of mail and packages, as well as information for health care practitioners and microbiologists. Information collated at these meetings is being distributed to all Northern Territory general medical practitioners, physicians and district disease control officers, and to these groups nationally. There have also been national teleconferences of chief health officers with Professor John Mathews to ensure comprehensive communication and information-sharing. Senior microbiologists have been involved in similar activities to coordinate laboratory procedures for suspect materials and their handling by laboratory personnel.
Territory residents should not feel unduly concerned. Advice from the Commonwealth’s Department of Health and Aged Care is that Australia is well-prepared for the very unlikely event of biological incident, and there is no reason to be alarmed by reports from America of cases of anthrax. National emergency action plans are in place for the protection of the population. I encourage people to be alert, but be assured that Territory agencies are now well-informed and prepared to respond if required.
Sale of NT Cattle to East Sumba
Dr TOYNE (Primary Industry and Fisheries): Madam Speaker, yesterday I met with a delegation from East Sumba, led by the Regent of East Sumba, Mr Umbu Mehang Kunda, to mark the purchase from the Territory of a consignment of breeder cattle by East Sumba.
Sumba is a relatively large island in eastern Indonesia, halfway between Kupang and Bali, and exports Ongole cattle, which are very similar to our Brahmans, to the Jakarta market. An initiative between the NT government and the Indonesian Minister for Trade and Industry previously resulted in a program of training conducted by my Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries in the autonomous regencies of Sumba. Sumba has two regencies, East and West, similar to our shires. The emphasis was on breeder herd management, as the region is one of the major cattle-producing areas in Indonesia, and likely customers for Northern Territory breeding cattle. Attendees of training courses also came from other islands in eastern Indonesia.
Representatives from East Sumba came to the Northern Territory in July to inspect cattle and select animals for purchase. The 600 breeding cows selected are due to be shipped to East Sumba at the end of the month and are presently going through standard quarantine preparation. Accompanying the cows will be two bulls donated by the Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries. While in the Northern Territory, the delegation will meet with the Mayor of Katherine to develop an information and cooperation agreement. They will also be inspecting the cattle being prepared for shipment at Carbeen Park, the depot facility of exporter, Wallco International.
A delegation from West Sumba is expected in the near future. They will be selecting similar breeding cows for shipment to the western regency. They are also keen to purchase local racehorses to add to their field of Sumba gallopers. The Martin government also looks forward to a positive and developing relationship with the governments of East and West Sumba. Our meeting yesterday has furthered that aim.
Reports noted pursuant to Sessional Order.
MOTION
Amendment to Standing Orders –
Standing Committees
Amendment to Standing Orders –
Standing Committees
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business)(by leave): Madam Speaker, I move the motion appearing on the Notice Paper, in a slightly amended form. The motion that is on the Notice Paper refers to: ‘That at the end of Standing Order 21A, add …’. Standing Order 21A refers to one committee only, and the intention for this amendment is for the change to apply to all committees, not just one.
The motion itself is designed to offer continuity to the lives of our parliamentary committee …
Madam SPEAKER: Could you read the amended motion to us now.
Mr STIRLING: I now move:
- That the terms of reference of Assembly standing committees be amended by adding at the end the following:
- The committee or a subcommittee be empowered to consider the minutes of proceedings, evidence taken
and records of similar committees established in previous Assemblies.
The purpose of the motion is to offer continuity to the life and work of our parliamentary committees which, we all know, end when the session of parliament ends at the end of the electoral cycle, and then they are re-formed under the new parliament. My advice is that only one of our parliamentary committees has this power and that is the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee, which can go back and revisit decisions, minutes, transcripts and all of the information records held in the name of that committee or a similar committee.
It would seem to me to be a right that should exist for all committees, to access the earlier work done on behalf of committees. An example would be that we now have a Substance Abuse Committee in this parliament. Previously, there was a Use and Abuse of Alcohol Committee. It seems to me that it would make sense to empower this new committee to be able to access the records, the transcripts, the interviews, the discussions that took place in Aboriginal communities - including those as far back as when that committee was formed - so that the committee had a view, in an historic context, of what those communities were saying, the views they were putting forward in relation to problems such as alcohol abuse, compared to where they may be sitting now. So, it is an ability to inform the committee of valuable work that has gone on in the past, other than the end-life of the committee, which usually was in the form of a report to this Assembly.
I urge members to support the motion. It is simply put forward as an enabling mechanism to enable members of committees in this parliament today to access that valuable earlier work on those occasions when they might need to. It simply avoids reinventing the wheel but it is more than that; it is enabling committee members to get that very valuable and, I think important in some cases, historical context as to how we may have gotten to the situation where we are today.
Madam Speaker, I urge members to support the motion.
Mr BURKE (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, in terms of the Deputy Chief Minister’s comments with regards to the rationale for moving this amendment, the opposition has no problems with it. It seems to me to be a commonsense approach considering the example he uses. I would raise the observation, though, that in terms of that particular example whilst a new committee has been formed, it would seem to me to be a simple part of the terms of reference of that committee to include the avenue for that committee to look back on previous reports if it so wishes as part of those terms of reference.
But in a general sense, it seems to me that, for example, in other committees, the Public Accounts Committee can inquire and report to the Assembly on any question referred to it by this Assembly. So as the government has the numbers, it is quite within the power of the government to refer any question to any committee by resolution of this Assembly.
What I would strike a note of caution about is I would hope that these committees do not spend too much of their time looking backwards. The intent of, I would hope, us all is to look forward in these issues. There are weighty issues that involve Territorians across a whole range of concerns. Certainly I would hope to see these committees looking forward in terms of the initiatives and recommendations that they bring forward rather than dwelling on some of the more contentious issues that we are all aware of that have raised their head from time to time in the past. If the committees got themselves bogged down in an exercise in hindsight rather than exercise in forward looking, it would be disappointing from the opposition’s point of view.
With those few comments, Madam Speaker, we support the intent of the motion.
Motion agreed to.
TABLED PAPER
Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report 2000-01
Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report 2000-01
Ms MARTIN (Treasurer): Madam Speaker, I table the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report 2000-01.
In accordance with section 9 of the Financial Management Act I am pleased to table, as Treasurer, my first Treasurer’s Annual Financial Statement for the 2000-01 financial year. The statement forms part of the 2000-01 Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report.
As part of my commitment for clear and unambiguous reporting of the financial outcomes of the Territory government, I have made a number of improvements to the format of the report. The overview has been expanded to include more analysis of the actual outcome compared with the 2000-01 published budget identifying key events during the year which contributed to significant variations. An analysis of the gross and net debt stocks over the time is also provided with greater emphasis on general government debt and the Territory’s other major liabilities being employee entitlements.
This foreshadows the move to shift government trading enterprises such as the Power and Water Authority out of the budget scope. The schedules within Part 1 have been reordered to show the budget sector outcome for 2000-01 using the economic transactions or ‘net’ presentations as the lead schedule. This summary table removes many of the transactions between government entities and hence provides a better basis for assessing the effect of the Territory’s budget on the economy. This is now followed by the gross outlays and the receipts of the public account and for individual agencies.
Published budget figures for comparison with the actual results have also been included in Part 1 for the first time. Schedule 1.8 shows approved variations made to the budget during the year for each agency by activity. This is now followed by a new schedule providing detailed explanation of significant variations between the published budget and the actual results for each agency.
Following recommendations from the recent Allan Report, data in respect of the Territory’s material liabilities, being net debt and employee entitlements, has been brought together and included in Part 10. Greater emphasis has also been given to general government sector debt levels. While these changes do not fully address my commitment for the report to be an informative document satisfying the needs of the lay person and members of the parliament, as well as the technocrats, they represent some marked improvements given the relatively short timeframe in which they have been implemented.
Schedules 1.1 to 1.3 show the budget sector outcome for 2000-01 using the economic transactions or net presentation. Schedule 1.1 shows a reduction in net debt or surplus of $41m for the 2000-01 financial year. However, I would like to draw your attention to two transactions which in effect overstate the reported result by $181m. The underlying result is, in fact, an increase in net debt or deficit of $140m.
The first transaction relates to the Conditions of Service Trust. As honourable members are undoubtedly aware, in the lead up to the 2001-02 budget the then government decided that the Conditions of Service Trust that had been held outside the public account would be wound up and the residual amount transferred to the public account in the form of a receipt. At the time of the transfer, the value of the Conditions of Service Trust investments was $157m. This transfer therefore had the impact of improving the budget outcome by $157m. This transfer does not represent an actual increase in the net worth of the Territory government; it is simply a transfer from one bucket to another bucket. This transfer has been strongly criticised by the Auditor-General in his report tabled in this House last week.
The other major transaction relates to an advance of $25m to the AustralAsia Railway Corporation. Due to conditions associated with the loan, the carrying value of this advance at 30 June 2001 has been assessed at $0.4m. This is a worse case scenario, but a reasonable reflection of the value at this point in time. This reduction in value also contributes to a further deterioration in the reported result for 2000-01 of $24.6m.
After adjusting for these two transactions, the published result of a decrease in net debt of $41m changes to an underlying increase in net debt of $140m. Comparing this underlying result to the 2000-01 published budget shows an increase in net debt of $95m. The deterioration in the budget result throughout the year was due to an increase in expenditure not matched by comparable revenue increases or savings. Recurrent expenditure in the year was $1876m, $74m higher than budgeted. The majority of the increase was due to increased operating costs with health and education alone contributing to almost half of the increase. Capital expenditure also increased, largely associated with the settlement and association acquisition of - guess what? - the Darwin to Katherine transmission line. Gross debt at 30 June 2001 using the Public Accounts scope was $2231m – you will find that detail in Schedule 4.1. This is $180m higher than in 1999-2000 and $246m higher than at 30 June 1999. This reflects the previous government’s need over the last two years to fund substantial budget deficits through increased borrowings.
The gross debt reported in Part 9 of $2242m is compiled on the Uniform Presentation scope, a broader scope from the Public Accounts scope. It includes entities external to the public account or off budget such as the AustralAsia Railway Corporation, PAWA subsidiaries Darnor and Gasgo, and the Northern Territory Legal Aid Commission. The gross debt is $178m higher than June 2000 and $243m higher than at June 1999, consistent with the changes in public account debt levels.
At the 30 June 2001, the Territory’s net debt under the Uniform Presentation scope was $1416m, an increase of $122m from 1999-2000. This is basically in line with the Public Account underlying budget outcome of $140m increase because the broader Uniform Presentation scope removes the positive impact of the Conditions of Service Trust transfer.
The Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report includes the Auditor-General’s Report providing a two part audit opinion. The first part provides an opinion on whether the statement is prepared from proper accounts and is presented fairly in accordance with the Financial Management Act. The second part provides an opinion on whether the statements have been prepared in accordance with applicable Australian accounting standards.
Australian Accounting Standard 31, applicable to whole-of-government public sector reporting, became operative in 1998-99. Compliance with the standard is not a legal requirement and the previous government chose not to comply with this standard. This made public scrutiny and assessment of fiscal outcomes much less transparent and more difficult than today’s community expects and deserves. Indeed, in contrast to the former government, my government believes that Territorians deserve the truth in how their taxes are collected and spent, and reported in ways that are more readily understood. We are all here to represent the community and to work in partnership with them.
I have foreshadowed the introduction of the fiscal integrity and transparency legislation during these sittings. This bill provides for open and transparent financial reporting and requires that fiscal reporting be based on external fiscal reporting standards that are independent of the government of the day. These standards include the accrual government finance statistics as well as the Australian Accounting Standards. While there is a 12 month period to provide for the transition to accrual reporting, the report in respect of the 2002-03 year should see compliance with Australian Accounting Standard 31.
I table the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report for 2000-01 which includes the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Statement.
Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the report.
Mr REED (Katherine): Madam Speaker, I take the opportunity to make some comments in relation to the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report. Much of the information, of course, that the Treasurer has just provided the House is already is publicly available notwithstanding that she is trying to present a ‘new broom sweeps clean’ approach here, and a feeling of comfort for everyone. There are issues that she has just taken credit for which were already in train by the former government in terms of the new accounting processes and reporting processes that the former government had announced and, indeed, was moving towards. So it is rather trite of her to try to take credit for it in terms of they’re all her new and wonderful bright ideas when they have, in fact, been announced.
There is detailed reference made to them in the budget debate and, indeed, in the budget speech that that action would have been proceeding in any event.
Ms Martin interjecting.
Mr REED: We listened to you quietly, so I would ask, Madam Speaker, for the same courtesies.
In terms of the matters to which the Treasurer refers, and trying to take credit for them and portray to the Northern Territory populace that she is introducing new measures that are going to be more open, more accountable and more answerable to the public, well, they were already underway. Anyone who has read the budget speech would be familiar with the new processes to which the honourable minister has just referred and the detail, indeed, which is in the budget documents for the year 2001-02 which themselves demonstrate a transition to the new reporting processes and the new requirements in terms of working for outcomes and the processes that were underway within and across government before the current government was elected. It ill behoves the Treasurer now to try to take credit for those initiatives.
It is fair to say that we are the last jurisdiction to move in that regard. But as I have explained, formerly as Treasurer, there was good reason for that. Those actions were taken in relation to the activities of the Northern Territory. One does not have to blindly follow interstate examples or initiatives in relation to how this government does anything. It is best for the government of the day, I believe, to determine what the appropriate processes are for the Territory rather than being dictated to by some interstate authority. That was very much the pressure with, for example, accrual accounting that former governments experienced. Earlier this year I announced, as Treasurer, that we would be proceeding as a government to introduce accrual accounting, and in fact that was included in the budget speech, and is another reason why the Chief Minister now cannot take credit for it, and we did it at a time that suited the Territory.
In terms of introducing accrual accounting historically, that is if it had been done five, six or more years ago, it would have been at a considerable cost. One of the benefits for proceeding to it now is that it has been achieved by other jurisdictions. That process has been applied, in some cases, for many years and the Territory is now able to move to accrual accounting using the experience that was gained by other jurisdictions, perhaps adopting some of the processes and practices that have been used by other jurisdictions and, in so doing, being able to do it at a much lower cost than would have been the case had we moved to it earlier. In any event, it is arguable, and I guess it depends on to which accounting school you attach your views, whether or not it is appropriate in any event. But the fact is that those initiatives that the Treasurer has just taken credit for were well in place before the Treasurer adopted the role that she now holds.
Ms Martin: Tell us about the Conditions of Service Trust.
Mr REED: The question of the Conditions of Service Trust I am more than happy to address.
Ms Martin interjecting.
Mr REED: It is interesting to note, and I pick up the interjection from the Treasurer, that for many years it had been suggested by no lesser an authority than the Auditor-General, that the Conditions of Service Trust should be brought onto budget. For their own reasons, the previous government did not do that, quite rightly. It was an appropriate course of action to have the Conditions of Service Trust outside budget. But, again, as I explained in the budget speech, because there was a move in transition to accrual accounting, which will be fully in place at the commencement of next financial year, and because the payments for the railway were made - and I remind Madam Speaker and honourable members that the payment for the railway was made from the Conditions of Service Trust, and most of that money came, of course, from the sale of the Ayers Rock Resort, about $100m in that regard which had been held in the Conditions of Service Trust so that it was set aside in the event that the railway was concluded, the negotiations, which they were successfully by the CLP government and Territorians are now reaping the benefit of it in terms of its construction. Given that that payment was made from the Conditions of Service Trust for the railway and that that left a residual amount in the Conditions of Service Trust of about $150m, it was considered appropriate at the time of preparing the 2001-02 budget, in the context of moving towards accrual accounting, that all of the Conditions of Service Trust be brought onto the budget. Otherwise, that part that was contributing towards the railway would have been moved onto budget this year, and the remainder would have had to be brought on next year, so why not do it in one clean step rather than progressively over time. It surprises me a little that the Auditor-General is somewhat critical of bringing it on to budget when there were calls in the past from him, and his office, to do so.
So I am happy to address the question of the Conditions of Service Trust. If the Treasurer thinks that that is an embarrassment, it was quite a logical move and it was quite strongly supported by Treasury.
In terms of the other matters she raises with great theatrical presentation, and in terms of the $149m, and this is a concern and something else is a concern, they were all reported in the budget papers. They were foreshadowed and advised to Territorians. That she should now try to present the fact as one that was concealed from Territorians, and we will get into that debate when we are talking about the Auditor-General’s report, is perhaps a demonstration that she is not across her job in terms of just what has been made publicly aware to Territorians, and what the facts are, and that she is really scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of trying to take credit for things that were already initiated, commenced, and well intended to proceed by the former government in any event.
Madam Speaker, I just say that it is time that the government recognise that they are now in government and they have to start making some decisions on behalf of Territorians. If you want to continue as a government playing blame politics, and looking in the rear vision mirror and being more concerned with what happened in the past rather than focussing on what is going to be an advantage in terms of the initiatives that you are going to introduce and pursue for Territorians, then that I think is what the business community is looking for.
A member: The black hole.
Mr REED: The interjection in relation to black holes - the business community, the contractors who are phoning me and leaving messages at my office, and taking the time to contact other members of the opposition - what they are concerned about is what the government is going to do.
Their message very clearly is: ‘We don’t care about black holes. We don’t care about what the interpretation of the current government is in relation to what they want to do as regards political gain. We are concerned that the government is now delaying the capital works project. We are concerned, as contractors, that in terms of creating work and keeping all our employees rather than having to lay them off, that there is tinkering now with the contract arrangements.’ There is a growing number of contractors each day who are contacting opposition members in relation to the new arrangements that are being put in place, the watering down of period contracts and the fact that contractors are having to now face the prospect of delayed payments. They may well win a contract, but whilst the tender documents call for commencement of a project within a month or six weeks of winning the tender, they are being advised, and there are now many examples before us, that whilst they have won the contract they cannot start work for some months, in some cases early next year. However, the contractor has to carry the cost of that impost of whatever increases occur between now and then, because there has been advice that they will not be allowed to put in for allowances for increased costs in the meantime. So, that is what Territorians are waiting to hear from this government.
They do not care about a summit. It is interesting to note that some of the participants in the summit, only a few months ago, were being referred to as members of a silver circle. How things change in a matter of time and how the Chief Minister can have one opinion in relation to particular individuals on one occasion, and after an election completely change that view and then look upon them quite differently. Similarly, with the attitude that she has adopted in relation to the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report. So, they are the challenges that the government now faces in relation to where they are going to carry the Northern Territory to, not what has happened in the past. Do you think for a moment that, had the CLP retained government, we would be walking around aimlessly, with offices closing, with shops and restaurants closing, with contractors laying off staff?
One contractor called me on Friday, after she saw the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure Development on television news last week, answering a question in relation to contracts that keep people employed in the Territory, standing up here and referring across the Chamber to ‘you idiots’. Well, that is not the image that hard working business men and women of the Northern Territory want to see of their ministers, creating jobs for Territorians, because that is not constructive. There is a great deal of fear and apprehension in the community following the 11 September incident and, although it happened in New York, that has permeated right throughout the world and the Northern Territory is no exception to that.
The Territory business community is looking for guidance. They are looking for the government to continue letting contracts in a way that will enable them to get on with the job and retain the number of employees that they already have, and what are they getting? They are getting contracts that won’t be honoured in terms of the tender document, that is start within a month, but being advised if they win the contract they will not be able to start in January. Now, there is at least one contractor who said, ‘I can not live with that and I hand the contract back’, and there are other contractors who have had to lay off their staff. One rang my office on Friday, and I spoke to him about his 10 employees, which he is reducing down to two, and he faces dire consequences because there are no decisions being made by this government in relation to means by which people can be …
Ms Martin: What a load of rubbish. Absolute load of rubbish.
Mr REED: …The Treasurer and Chief Minister interjects and says rubbish. I ask her to check what is happening with the tender arrangements, because the minister does not know. The minister’s answer was ‘you idiots, you idiots’. Well, can I say, after seeing the minister on television last week, I am a great supporter of televising of Question Time, because it is getting the message across to Territory businessmen and businesswomen in a way better than the opposition could ever do it. It sent the shivers through contractors, men and business women of the Northern Territory, last Thursday night when they saw the minister responsible for generating jobs and economic activity in the Northern Territory not responding in a way that was at all positive.
That is what people are looking for after 11 September. They are looking for guidance from the government. They are looking for a continuance of the ability to gain government work, and do not underestimate, Madam Speaker - and I know that you would not - the importance of the government work program, capital works, repairs and maintenance, and the ongoing period contracts to the Northern Territory economy. They have stalled, and they have stalled not for good reason. They have stalled because this government has priorities of its own which it wants to introduce. That is quite expected of a new government. But what they should have is the ability and the courage to stand up and say, ‘We are going to change our priorities’, not, ‘Oh, we have to change our priorities because of black holes and because of CLP successive governments…’, and all of these historical things that they are trying to drag forward. They are simply being used as a screen and a reason for them to be able to be - at the same time in the background - reordering their priorities, being able to come out and announce them after a summit and blame the summit, the CLP, the black hole, for introducing new taxes or for increasing charges or for scrapping a particular activity of the former government which hey really should have the courage to announce themselves as one of their own priorities.
If they are going to scrap a particular activity that was pursued by the former government, I think Territorians would wear that, because they understand that there is now a new government. They might not accept it, but they would understand that a new government would have new priorities. Well, if you have new priorities, have the courage to stand up before Territorians and explain to them what those new priorities are.
Territorians are not into blame politics. They are into looking to where they are going and what you, as a government, is going to do to help them get there, to sustain their businesses, to continue employing Territorians and to continue generating activity across the Northern Territory economy. The sooner this government recognises that, the better. I have broad shoulders: I do not care if they blame me for black holes, for all sorts of other things that they want to do. It is only a matter of time I think before they blame me for 11 September. They blame me for everything else, and it is only a matter of time before they suggest that I have been working as a cohort of Bin Laden’s, and that I am responsible also for the World Trade fiasco and the dreadful occurrences there, and the consequences that that has had on not only the American economy but the world economy, and the fact that we felt that here.
I call upon the government to be able to focus on the needs of Territorians, focus on the future. Let the capital works program continue to flow because contractors, whilst hearing the utterances of the government in terms of, ‘We are honouring the former government’s capital works programs’, know they are not. What happens when contractors win a contract through the tender process and are subsequently told, ‘The goods news is you have won the contract. The bad news is you cannot start within the time that it said in the tender documents – four to seven weeks, but you can start in January next year’, and when the contractor subsequently asks, ‘Okay, well, I might be able to live with that. Is there any opportunity for me to take into account increased costs that might accrue in the interim?’ Madam Speaker, you are aware of the volatility of just one item, fuel costs, in terms of those issues that contractors have to face in these times of uncertainty. And the answer comes back from the government, ‘No’. Well, do not fool yourselves that the contracting fraternity is happy.
Do not fool yourselves that the small contractors across the Northern Territory are happy with your summit, because they largely see themselves, as one told me on the phone last Friday, as left out of the summit. You can have the summit on the Internet, you can have it sent with messages through carrier pigeons, you can nail summit documents to light poles in the northern suburbs, in Tennant Creek and in Alice Springs, but the small contractors are having a tough time because of your indecision. They are out there trying to earn a quid. They are out there trying to keep their employees employed. They are out there not trying to reduce their employees, as one from Darwin told me last Friday from 10 to two, and they do not give a fig about your summit. They do not care, and the reason they do not care is because they just do not have time to commit themselves on a Sunday, Monday and a Tuesday to some talkfest.
If you think for one moment that a contractor is going to take the time to come in here and say, ‘I do not agree with the introduction of a land tax’, well, it is just a nonsense. You do not have to get the business community sitting around a table to say that they do not want a land tax. The answer is self-evident, and the answer should be self-evident to you in relation to what the business community is thinking at the moment. Have a walk down the mall and have a look at the office space that is available; have a look at the shops that are closing. A journalist recently told me during the course of an interview, ‘I went to get lunch yesterday and walked in the door of the building where I normally get lunch, and the food outlet that I normally get my lunch was closed, gone, finished’. That is the picture that this government has to address.
The CLP, as a government re-elected, would not have fallen in a big hole in the way that this government has. The activities of government would have continued. In terms of being in government, the other thing that you have to recognise as a new Labor government, is that you have to be innovative. If you see these problems, do not walk around wringing your hands; you have to find some answers to it.
The most recent example that I could give to you of some innovation was the QuickStart program which, I see in a media report recently, was successful beyond all expectations. There was a view that if the QuickStart program was successful, it would have been responsible for the construction of 100 new homes, and if we could reach the target of 100 then that would have been exceedingly successful. I noticed a media report recently where, in fact, it looks like the outcome is something like 220. That is innovation. That is a way that a government can, without interfering in business - which is what you are doing with your process - that is, creating an enormous amount of doubt and concern right across the business community and threatening them with land taxes; threatening them with increased electricity, water, sewerage and other charges; threatening them with the red tape and the administrative burden of a land tax, which is a very burdensome arrangement and way to raise money, they are creating concerns. What you have to do as a government is to be innovative and act in a way that will engender confidence in the business community, and be innovative in a way that will generate economic activity across the community. So have a look at the QuickStart program. You might want to reintroduce it. It may be well worth the consideration of giving it another run, because that is what government is all about, or what it should be all about. It should be about facilitating activity in the business community. It should be about facilitating the construction industry, in that case, to get on with the job and to provide them with additional work.
It is worthy of note that the construction of 220 homes that came out of the QuickStart innovative program cost $1m. In terms of 100 homes, I think the value of their construction from memory was $20m. Yet, the program, in fact, generated 220 homes by that report in the NT News. So it generated something in the order of $50m worth of construction industry activity across the Northern Territory. That is the type of program that this government should be focussing on. They have to become innovative. They have to start generating some ideas that are going to be able to help Territorians remain in business, and to be able to continue employing Territorians and those Territorians who are struggling to achieve that - and that is where the engine room of the economy is: it is out in the business sector.
It is not in this Chamber. It is not in government, notwithstanding that government can play a very important role to facilitate the engine room of the economy and bearing in mind that it is the small business community that generates most of that activity, and that is what this government should be focusing on. They do not care one little sniff about black holes; they do not care about the historical events of what happened before. They do remember that when there was a CLP government, if a problem arose in the construction industry, they would have a QuickStart program to generate work.
If a problem arose in historical terms as to a problem with the larger construction industry such as it was in the early 1990s when this program was started to build this Parliament House and the precinct and the court house, that the government facilitated activity within the private sector and it got things going. Well, they are waiting for this government to get things going and they are very frustrated that the government, notwithstanding the fact that they can get together the legislation to get rid of mandatory sentencing, however important it was to the Labor government, it was not important to the contractors who are trying to keep the economy going.
They were able to find time to do that. They were able to find, I expect, an enormous amount of time to organise a sorry day. Well, the real priority is with the economy. The rhetoric that the Treasurer just went on with is hollow nonsense in terms of what the community expect and how you are going to be innovative enough to keep creating jobs in the Territory, but all the rhetoric of the Treasurer’s Annual Financial Report, is nothing because it gives nothing and delivers no jobs to Territorians. The contractors and the business community will remember you for your lack of innovation.
Motion agreed to; paper noted.
TABLED PAPER
Proposed Information Act and Discussion Paper
Proposed Information Act and Discussion Paper
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Madam Speaker, I table a draft Information Bill 2001 together with a discussion paper inviting comment on the proposed legislation.
Madam Speaker, Territory Labor has long espoused the principle of open and accountable government. One of the Labor government’s key initiatives in this area is the development of an Information Bill. This bill will provide a framework for the management of government information in the Northern Territory. It will cover access to government information, privacy principles for information and records management principles in government in a one-piece legislation.
Before I provide honourable members with some detail of the proposed legislation, it is fair to say that from this government’s point of view, this legislation should have been enacted in the Territory years ago. Territorians for many years have understood that when Territory Labor assumed government, legislation to provide Territorians with access to personal and government information should be very high on the agenda, and so it is.
It is with an enormous sense of pride that I table this discussion draft Information Bill and the accompanying discussion paper in this first parliamentary sittings of the Labor government. The proposed information legislation is unique in many respects, but two are worthy of note. The first is that this one piece of legislation deals with a number of aspects dealt with in separate pieces of legislation elsewhere. This proposal, in one bill, includes access to personal and government information, the privacy principles that govern personal information held in both public and in some areas of the private sector, and a legislative regime for keeping and managing government records. The draft bill is also unique in that it is not driven by paper-based economy as is most similar legislation throughout Australia. This draft bill is driven by an information-based economy. Accordingly, it will place the Territory in a competitive advantage over other jurisdictions.
There is one more feature that I wish to draw to the attention of honourable members. That feature is that the proposed model is based on the resolving of disputes on applications for access to information or breaches of privacy principles, not by the courts but rather by a statutory appointed Information Commissioner who will mediate the resolution of disputes. Such an approach is certainly less litigious and is likely to be less costly to the community. Again, there is no similar legislation in Australia that can claim such innovation. This proposed legislation is cutting edge and reflects world’s best practice in those areas covered in the draft bill.
Turning to more detail in the discussion draft, honourable members will note that there are four main components to the bill. They are:
- the right of access to government and personal information;
privacy of personal information according to prescribed information privacy principles;
the appointment of an independent statutory officer, the Information Commissioner, to oversee
the combined access to government and personal information and privacy regimes; and
legislative based codes of practice for keeping and managing government records and information
with an emphasis on electronic records and information.
The draft bill is premised on all government and personal information being accessible. However, there are categories of information that it may be in the public interest not to disclose.
This Labor government will be distinguished by its consultation with the Territory community. We want Territorians to have a say in this draft bill. To that end there will be public information sessions on the content of the draft bill in both public and private sectors throughout the Territory between now and the end of the year. There will be broad consultation with the Territory community on its views of the proposed legislation. The government is determined Territorians will have input to the draft bill and accordingly the closing date for any comments will be 28 February 2002.
I believe that this draft bill provides Territorians with a model of privacy principles and an access to government and personal information regime and a framework of accountable and responsible government records management that is, by any measure, world’s best practice. The proposed bill is at the cutting edge for such legislation and is far superior to any other legislation in Australia, particularly as its focus is the information age and economy, and the 21st century.
Madam Speaker, I look forward to Territorians’ comments on the bill and I look forward, after taking account of all the comments received, to introducing in the first half of the year 2002 an Information Bill for Territorians.
Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the paper.
Mr BURKE (Opposition Leader): Madam Speaker, it is pleasing at last to get a copy of this draft bill. I note the minister’s comments in introducing this draft legislation. The only thing missing from his comments was to provide heartfelt thanks to the efforts of the previous government in bringing forward what he has described as cutting edge legislation.
If you were honest with Territorians, you would accept and admit that this cutting edge legislation is the work of the CLP government but obviously it will take time to digest what actually has been brought forward. It is good to see that the Information Commissioner has been included as being a person who acts in a similar role to the Ombudsman. I have not, in a quick perusal of this draft legislation, seen whether or not the Commissioner has his own reference powers to seek FOI. I will look at that in due course. But in a general sense, as this is a draft bill out for public discussion, the opposition will peruse it. I seek leave to continue my remarks at a later hour.
Leave granted.
Debate adjourned.
ADDRESS-IN-REPLY
Continued from 18 October 2001.
Mr DUNHAM (Drysdale): Madam Speaker, the Address-in-Reply is a very important debate. It sets the directions of government and it is a debate that enunciates to, not just researchers but to those people who have been in the thick of an election, just what government intends to do having won. It is interesting when you read the Address-in-Reply, it is a little bit schizophrenic in terms of the contributions by members opposite. The rhetoric that was used in describing the directions of the new government did have a flavour of the election promises that were made and it is also interesting that on Tuesday, 16 October, those promises were broken within hours. What we have here is the hallmarks of a fledgling government which has been able to go to an election and secure the numbers necessary to make government in this House which, within very short time, was going backwards at a million miles an hour on some of those promises. It is my intention to track these promises because they will make worthwhile fodder for not only future elections but also for the integrity and honour of this government when it is judged again.
It is not my intention to be very long in this debate but I will point out that if people look to the maiden speeches, to the speech by His Honour the Administrator and to the speeches made by members of the government who have been in the House previous to the election, you will see a great many accolades for the previous government. They occur in a variety of ways, generally to do with lifestyle. People who arrived late on the scene like, for instance, the current Chief Minister who came here and fell in love with this place and decided that this was where she would live, she enjoyed the lifestyle, she enjoyed our multiculturalism, she enjoyed our natural attributes, she enjoyed the trappings that had been provided to the citizenry by government.
That stuff, as I have pointed out once before, does not happen by accident. In fact, the government put in an enormous amount of money into sporting facilities like the Marrara Sporting Stadium. There are many of us in this House who have used those facilities. The closure of some of the rivers and the confidence that Territorians and visitors to this place, because it is a growing tourism market, can go to our waterways and catch a fish. The multiculturalism and the resources that are being provided to a variety of ethnic groups in this place and the ease with which government …
Mr Henderson: Well, why did you preference One Nation?
Mr DUNHAM: I think a contribution has been made by the member for Wanguri and his contribution can stand in parliament, rather than by way of interjection.
The first point is that there are a number of accolades for government there and I think we are going to get another run this afternoon when the health minister is going to make an attempt to say how wonderful things are in health but how they had nothing to do with the government but rather an array of public servants who did things in spite of the government. It is a theme that we will see that is in keeping with some of the rhetoric of finding a scapegoat, and the scapegoat inevitably will be us.
Let’s move to the things that can be broadly categorised as rhetoric and propaganda and, in some places, distortions of the truth and fraud. I go to the very commencement of the debate where one talks about priority areas, and it occurs within a very short space of His Honour the Administrator’s speech. It talks about the priorities of my government - so it is right up the top – ‘…will be to reinforce and enhance the necessary open and accountable democratic structures, in other words to provide good government’. ‘Good Government’ is also a label that occurred on the cover of one of their documents in the campaign that described how they would set up the machinery of government. Interestingly, we quickly moved after that into debate about good government and a reneging was seen immediately.
At lunchtime, Mr Deputy Speaker, the member for Greatorex, yourself and I will with members of the government comprise the Public Accounts Committee. The Public Accounts Committee was discussed in this House many times and it has done some very very good work. As described prior to the election, you and I would have been going to a meeting that comprised even numbers of government and opposition, and that elected its own chair, and it could take motions of its own finding. They are pretty important elements; they were described in a fairly transparent way and they are now missing. So that particular backflip is pretty important because it was seen not only as a very high priority in His Honour the Administrator’s speech, not only was it a document that was paraded before the people, it has been taken to this parliament, it has been taken that this parliament has done something in a covert way that no other parliament did and that the new broom would come in and fix that. Well they have not, and that is only one of them.
The difficulty we have had as an opposition is that there are not many documents we can go to. The primary source documents I guess are the promises that were made and we now have a series of reneging all the way through. The other thing that we have is the so-called Access Economics Report and the clean bill of health. We have two documents from Professor Percy Allan, so we are up to several documents. We have some press releases and we have this parliament. It is very interesting that there are massive contradictions in all these documents. The one that I would be most interested in is whether the Percy Allan report provides the primary source document for the government. In the event that it does, we can jettison some of the others that contradict Percy Allan and we can concentrate on that particular document. One of the difficulties we have is the current government is working off three or four documents that are in total disagreement with each other. I would be happy to work from the Professor Percy Allan report. I understand that it is mooted that it be the source document for the coming Economic Summit, and we could cut to the chase pretty quickly if we accept that the government will implement Percy Allan’s report. Percy Allan has been widely quoted about his discovery of this famous black hole and if that is the only portion that the government wants to hang on to, come out and say that - one portion that we will hang on to; the rest of it is actually rubbish.
Alternatively, they may wish to pursue Professor Percy Allan’s report. We know that they have already jettisoned the land tax; we hear sounds that that is the case. We hope, too, that they will jettison some of the other things that Professor Percy Allan has in there but we would like that to be stated for the obvious reasons.
The maiden speeches I thought were reasonably good. We are yet to hear from the member for Barkly. I believe that it is important for this House to hear those maiden speeches because they do set the tenor for an incoming member, what they personally believe they will do and what they will achieve, and their belief systems. For that reason I thought it was really important that as a parliament we attend to those in the normal Westminster tradition of quietly hearing what they had to say without interruption. I was disappointed, because it also is a further indicator of the contempt with which this House is held by the new Chief Minister that she not only walked in and out, she spoke while her new members were speaking. She walked to and fro in front of them and that she had various pieces of very important paper that she had to parade in and out of the House.
Dr TOYNE: A point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. The member knows that he cannot refer to the presence or absence of a member in the House. I would ask him to withdraw.
Mr DUNHAM: I am happy to, Mr Deputy Speaker. I shall not refer to her absence in and out of the House. I was merely referring to her lack of good behaviour when her own members were making their maiden speeches. Those who spoke would be aware that, in the main, the entire opposition sat and listened and, as I said, I think that is very important.
There were a couple of things in their speeches which I think are flaws in how they have been briefed or how they perceive things. I am hopeful that this House will be instrumental in educating some of those new members because some of the language that was used was intemperate and not factual. I think that if you have the opportunity to go back to those maiden speeches at some future time perhaps with some more wisdom you will be able to see that.
One of the words I will pick up was from the member for Millner where he used the word ‘illegitimate’ to describe the government. From somebody who purports to be a lawyer they should know what the word illegitimate means and the legitimacy of the previous government is pretty much the same as the legitimacy of this government. We have both been elected by a process, the process is democratic and the process is entirely legitimate. That kind of reflection on our parliamentary systems and democracy does not do him good. It may well be that he was speaking passionately to an audience or a gallery and the word slipped out, but I caution him to be careful with that sort of language because, in this House it goes down forever. This is on the permanent public record. It could well be that his grandchildren are elected to here and they will read that speech and I think it would be a good thing, too. In all likelihood they may represent a different party if the Labor government does what we think it will do and cause such problems for this place that they disappear without a trace.
Various members spoke about how they came to power and they thanked various people. I was really quite surprised that, by omission, the One Nation Party was not mentioned, because I recall seeing the new member for Casuarina, with the euphoria of the night, attributing that as one of the major factors for his election, and since the election they have gone very quiet on it. I, too, do not really like to talk about the One Nation Party because I think you only give them oxygen. They are an irrelevance. How they do business is not something that attracts me to them. But it should be put on the record that they were a major feature in the election of the Labor Party. I am surprised that those opposite did not use it to describe truly and factually how they obtained office because, certainly in the case of the member for Millner, it was a significant factor.
When you come to this House, there is a great honour, and the honour is to work for the benefit of Territorians, all the people, including members of One Nation, surprisingly, and there is also, when you leave, a few things that come with it. One of them, often spoken about in the press, and that is this wondrous superannuation. I have never inquired to any great length to find out what that is, but we are well remunerated here and well remunerated on exit. The other thing is the great satisfaction, particularly of being in government and if you have been a minister, of the things that you have done. I know on this side we have great pride in the things we have done. Many of us can stand up and catalogue them, can catalogue our own personal attachment to them or involvement in them, and that is quite a buzz, to be able to be in this place and contribute to its benefit.
The other thing that one could take is honour, and that is a commodity that those currently in government should look at carefully, because it is a commodity that is a bit like virginity. It can be squandered and having been squandered it is very difficult to retrieve. Some of the members opposite should look at that. They should look at the fact that they had a racist element to their campaign, something that enabled them to woo voters. I, again, do not really like to talk about the One Nation Party because it only gives them a status they do not deserve, but it definitely was a factor. It is something that those opposite should look at, particularly given that they take a great puritan attitude about their access to a variety of ethnic groups in the community, but to be elected on a racist campaign is something they will live with. It is a thing that has been thrown across this Chamber many times. It does offend me because I have been to election on a number of occasions, including for people who are initiated ceremony men and at the end of that election, been accused of running a racist campaign, which left me quite astonished.
It is a good thing for this parliament to see the colour of the Chinese New Year and the dragon coming and blessing this House, to see the member for Arafura escorted into the place, but we have to be careful that these are not mere theatrics and rhetoric. We have to be careful that we actually do pursue policies that are not racist. I am very proud to be able to say that I have been connected with the CLP in many elections and we do not, and have not, played the so-called race card ...
Mr Ah Kit interjecting.
Mr DUNHAM: This is interesting, I was involved in the campaign that saw the member for Arnhem elected to this parliament, and our two Aboriginal candidates, Mujiji Nungarggull and Terry Yumbulul, were both very surprised that the Labor Party made some sort of allegation that they had run a racist campaign. But, on the other hand, the member for Arnhem had - we did obtain a statutory declaration on this, though it is all water under the bridge now - talked to people about the loss of their land, the loss of unemployment benefits, the desecration of sacred sites and all that other rhetoric that is taken out in the form of push polling to Aboriginal communities. I have seen it myself in action. The member for Arnhem also talked about the ceremony man. We talked to Bernard Tipiloura when he stood in the seat of Arafura and we asked how he would like to be known, and he said, ‘I would like to be known as I am’. He said, ‘I am a man who is proud of his ceremony, and I am a ceremony man’. That was his slogan - Bernard Tipiloura, a ceremony man. And it was seen to be a racist campaign. It was seen to be a racist campaign for this man to describe something that he had immense pride in, that he was very proud of and that he thought he brought to this parliament as a unique and special attribute of his own.
Females stand and they say, ‘Vote for me; I am a woman’. I do not think that is a gender bigotry thing; I think it is people describing the particular traits they can bring to this parliament. So, I think we should revisit the campaign just for those couple of things. I shan’t speak to all the maiden speeches, but I would advise members to re-read what they said. The new minister for health who claims that upon seeing naked people she is well equipped for the job, I would suggest that she has a few more hoops to jump through rather than just seeing the naked male form, and if it was that easy she can buy books to do that sort of stuff.
In my own case, I am very pleased to be the shadow minister for health and community services, and the shadow member for essential services, because I think I can make a good contribution. The member would know that I have not sought to attach media comment to the issues I have brought to her attention. I am disappointed that it has now been some time since the election and she has not seen fit to answer those questions which are now building up.
I note that the bill we have before us, the Information Bill, talks in great glowing terms about how you can get information out of the government. Well, I can tell you, it ain’t that easy. I like the business about where you write to the departments and they answer within 30 days. If they do not answer within 30 days, it is taken as a refusal. This is brilliant, because if you work on the basis of this bill that is here as a discussion paper, pretty much the letters I have written to the current health minister could be taken as a refusal to answer those issues. I will give a pledge here that I will try to work collaboratively and in concert. It is my hope that the current government does not muck up as badly as I fear they may. The optimist in me hopes that the current government will struggle through and things won’t be as bad as I think they may well be, because I do not think we can afford to have a calamity on our hands. The hiatus that we have had now, with two months of inaction, is very dangerous. It is very bad, not only for business and commercial interests, but it is bad for public service, the confidence of this place and other issues, and I would urge that they get on with the task.
I will make every attempt to be collaborative in my approach. I shan’t use the same methodology that was employed by the opposition, and I am quite happy to say that right at the forefront. One of the things that can make you a sitting duck as a health minister is when people bring in tragic stories and say, ‘How are you going to fix it?’ The unfortunate reality in the health sector is often there are things you cannot fix. Often there are things in human services that even the best result is still something that causes all of us some grief, even those who are players in it, merely part players.
So, I shan’t be adopting the method of the member for Wanguri where he brought things of that ilk in and used the calamitous circumstances in people’s own lives, or their own health status, as a rock to throw at government. Interestingly, most of those cases were treated a bit like a dirty tissue and discarded immediately he had achieved his end, which was to have a whack at the government.
I will point out that one of the letters I have on the minister’s desk is a letter about the Patient Assisted Travel scheme. It is quite a good scheme that operated under the previous government. It was certainly, compared to other places, generous and it afforded Territorians the right of access that others take for granted. If you read Hansard and the contributions of the member for Wanguri, you will see that he thought that there should be some political interference in that. I would seek right at the outset that that is not the case, that it be based on a medical rather than a political judgment. I would seek that the new health minister make some of those comments early so that people do not believe that the system has now changed to such an extent that it replicates that, that the now government used when they were in opposition.
I am also very pleased to have the portfolio area of essential services, and I am pleased to see that it seems to be business as usual. It is good that we are moving towards a corporate structure for the Power and Water Authority. It is a remarkably efficient organisation. The things that were problems in that area, and were used in this parliament to somehow denigrate government, will continue to be problems; there will continue to be trees that grow fast and fall over on power lines, there will continue to be lightning strikes, there will continue to be flying foxes in Katherine that take out the power. I shall not be laying those at the feet of government. In the case of the flying foxes in Katherine, the Power and Water Authority moved very quickly to remedy the problem. It is an organisation that will continue to do that; they will continue to put their best efforts in place.
There are some dilemmas I have with regard to some of the promises that were made: power to Dundee, for instance; the undergrounding of power at the cost of some $80m; the promise to keep the power price at the same level for the next four years. These are things that I would like to see some firm assurances on, because they actually do contradict largely what Professor Percy said. He said that they should be run on commercial, not political lines. I am happy to find the quote in the papers for members opposite if they have not seen it. But those decisions made as political promises are exactly that, they are political promises. They are not commercial promises. I can tell you the Power and Water Authority would not present me with a works list that had Dundee Beach right up the top, nor the undergrounding of power in the leafy northern suburbs.
So having made those political promises, I am very keen to see how they will be pursued. If it is government’s intention to renege, sure, I will make a noise about it because I think that they fibbed to the electorate. I think they should, in their repertoire of options, put that in: ‘We told the punters some dumb things. We are now in government. We realise they are dumb, we are not going to do it’. That should be among their repertoire of options. Like the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, I think they should be able to just say it. I do not think they should have to say, ‘Look, there is a black hole’, or, ‘We thought the power was going to cost this’, or, ‘We thought we were going to sell hole-in-the-ground technology’ or whatever it is. Just say it. Make decisions and say it because one of the things you are going to find in government is that many people do not like what you do. You are not going to be loved by everybody all the time. You are going to have to make decisions that are on the best basis for all of the Territory and for all of its citizens, so you should go ahead and do that.
In the time remaining, I would like to talk about my electorate of Drysdale. The electorate of Drysdale is the electorate that changed most during the last election. Although there were other electorates that changed vastly on a geographic basis, and I count in this the member for Stuart’s electorate, the electorate which he said that he could not adequately service. I will be interested to know whether he still has those sentiments that he told, not only this parliament but the Electoral Redistribution Committee, that he was incapable of servicing that electorate. I think it is a very difficult thing to be sitting there now as the member for Stuart having made the admission that it was beyond your capabilities.
So notwithstanding his boundary changes, my changes were more demographic which is, after all, why we are here. Mine was more to do with people. There was a significant change that now sees me just around the corner here in Woolner Road and all the way out to the Elizabeth River Bridge. Indeed, I am a neighbours of yours, Mr Deputy Speaker. Largely, the population is in Palmerston, where I will be seeking to move my office. I will say for the Parliamentary Record, that it is taking longer than I would like, but certainly, as soon as I can get out to Palmerston with my electorate office, that is where I will be. It remains a very important infrastructure base for the Territory. Indeed the port is there, a large lump of the harbour, major arterials into Darwin, the inter-modal change, the terminal of the railway, they will all be in the electorate. So it is something that is very important in terms of my electoral workload, not just to carry those things that relate to the people that live in the suburbs of Drysdale, but also those businesses that have many millions of dollars tied up there. It encompasses Berrimah, Winnellie, and as I said, the port and the TDZ. I will make it my business to make sure I know the issues that confront those people. Many of them I know already, and I will be making a point of making sure that their interface with government is good. If it cannot be achieved by direct approach then possibly, it can through me.
The last couple of things I will say is that, I am in this parliament as an elected member and a former minister, but in a previous life I was an advisor. I think that that is where I have some skill and ability to give something to the government. I can visit this in future debates, but for this debate it is really important that we look forward. It is really important that we grab the issues, we grab the opportunities, we are focused on the horizon, we are looking out five and 10 years, not just what is happening now, what we have to do before the next election, because that is the legacy that those opposite inherited. They inherited a legacy of very forward looking governments - governments that built the university before its time; governments that built this place probably before its time; governments that were not satisfied with how the Commonwealth ran things and grappled it with both hands.
This is a government that introduced more local government than any other place. There were only four municipal councils when you came here, Mr Deputy Speaker. Indeed, the council that you left as President of, just recently, was established in the period of stewardship of the CLP government. So, we have left a great legacy for them, and the greatest legacy is our ability to look into the future and to look at opportunities that might be out 10 or 15 years. I would urge them that they do that as their first and foremost thing, and also that they look to the domestic situation that occurs now and their capacity to benefit it. How to benefit it is clarity on issues, confidence in government directions, discarding the things that are nonsensical or that it has decided not to pursue, good government management, and also spending that enormous amount of money which occurs in the budget, largely which flows back into the community and which has to be spent as a matter of some priority.
Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I look forward to future opportunities to address the parliament. They seem to be fewer and fewer these days, and later and later. But it would contribute largely to debates if the government could enshrine those things they want to hold, and alert us to the things that they want to jettison because an enormous amount of time could be spent pursuing some of the nonsense that is in Percy Allan’s report and other reports, and it could be obviated merely by them saying, ‘Sorry, we ain’t going to do that’.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Mr Deputy Speaker, I seek leave to make my remarks from your table, because I notice there is no microphone here and Hansard may have difficulty hearing me.
Leave granted.
Mrs BRAHAM: I want to make it quite clear that I am standing to give my Address-in-Reply as the member for Braitling, not as the Speaker. As the Speaker, I do not intend to participate in debates, but I certainly do want to get on the public record some of my thoughts about the last 11 months.
I am pleased to be back in the Chamber. The last 11 months have been quite full of downs and ups for myself and my family. But what I have learnt throughout this period is that Territorians have a strong sense of justice and fair play, and that is why I am back here and not the CLP candidate for Braitling.
Members: Hear, hear!
Mrs BRAHAM: They disliked intensely what the CLP did to me and have continued to do with their candidates ever since then. The CLP seems to have lost that sense of community that they used to have and have certainly lost their support base, particularly in the Alice Springs branch from where I came. I personally think they have been left with what I would call the power-mad, egotistical people. They have lost the good, decent people. They have actually walked away. All they have left are the dregs.
It was not easy to come in here in February and sit as an Independent, particularly after the public humiliation and threats that had been made against me and particularly as most of my former colleagues would not even look me in the eye, acknowledge me or talk to me. I felt very much like a leper. I have to admit, though, there were some ministers when I did contact their offices, who were prepared to listen and assist me. The worst treatment of all was dealt to me by the member for Greatorex who took over three of my portfolios. He denied me my right as an elected member of this House to information and communication with his advisory staff and departmental staff.
Dr Lim: You have to come through the minister, don’t you? The same thing are your rules: come through the minister. Yes, that’s right.
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Member for Greatorex! Order!
Mrs BRAHAM: I seek leave to table this e-mail that says simply:
- For future references, all requests relating to Central Australia, local government and housing has to come
through me and not any of my officers.
Leave granted.
Dr Lim: What was wrong with that?
Mrs BRAHAM: What was wrong with that was that the minister refused to speak to me. He still refuses to speak to me. Any requests to speak to him about a matter, he refused to return my calls, his advisory staff were, I think, in fear. They would not answer me. Worst of all, he politicised the public servants, people I have known for years in Alice Springs who then had to say to me, ‘We cannot talk to you; the minister has forbidden it’. I think that is pretty disgusting.
His behaviour continued to be unparliamentary. I will not talk about the personal remark he made about me in the House. He tabled a petition relating to the Salvation Army Hostel for homeless men, but before he did he read through those names on that petition and some of those people were rung up and abused for signing it. Now, I think that is one of the worst examples of abuse of parliamentary privilege that I know. I know those people will not forget his attitude in doing that. Anyone should be able to sign a petition without fear. Anyone should be able to sign a petition and have an opinion, but this member abused that position.
I have to admit his attitude was typical of the attitude of the CLP throughout the campaign. A constituent who allowed me to put a poster up in his front yard of his business was rung not once but five times in an effort to have him take it down. A contractor who had a sticker on his bumper was rung and told to take it off. The CLP candidate had a banner displayed for four weeks. I put mine up and within 24 hours I had a fax saying ‘It is illegal; take it down’. How about that for favouritism? These standover tactics, this bullying, these threats were the reason the CLP lost government. People were basically tired of that attitude, tired of being intimidated, tired of listening to this rhetoric. And the government should keep in mind that they are in government not because the majority voted for Labor but because they voted against the CLP. That was very obvious.
The Independents had, for the first time in Territory elections, a strong influence on the results. There were five seats - and five of you are sitting here in the House; your seats were decided on Independent preferences, so just remember that. There are now two Independents in this parliament. The Independents gained a total of 10% of the total vote but of the 14 seats they contested, they achieved 18% of that vote. That is higher than any minority party that has contested elections in the Northern Territory and it indicates a trend that is occurring in the electorate. The other seven seats that the Independents contested were won by the sitting party, but often with a very reduced majority. There is a lesson there to be learnt for all people in this parliament today: this is the beginning of a challenge to you and Independents will not disappear; they will be the next time around.
I want to thank all those Independents who had a go, particularly those who were in our circle. We all learnt a wise lesson about how to run a campaign and they will certainly be wiser next time around. It is a costly business. You put yourself up for public criticism by standing for election. You put yourself up to public scrutiny. It is not an easy decision to make, particularly as you do not have that support of large, major parties behind you to assist you. Everything you do - your media releases, your statements, your door-knocking - is all done by you and you alone.
May I say election day was quite exciting. I had a wonderful team who were up early and they were certainly most enthusiastic in the handing out. The sour spot of the day for me was the poster put up by the CLP that claimed a vote for Loraine Braham is just a vote for Labor. Now, the Labor Party put me number four on their preferences - thanks very much, guys - and the CLP put me number three, so there were certainly no favours from either party as regards to preferences, but obviously people did not take any notice of the card. They had decided for themselves how to vote and that is why I am here and the CLP candidate is not.
I considered that poster to be offensive and to contravene the act. I believe it was designed to deliberately mislead voters. So I contacted the Electoral Office on that day with an official complaint. The reply came back later that they had obtained a legal opinion; that poster was okay. Now, I do not know. If you think that a statement says ‘A vote for Loraine Braham is just a vote for Labor’ is not trying to mislead voters, I do not know what is. I really believe it was.
Even though at the end of the day I won the seat, and I am certainly grateful to the voters of Braitling for doing that, I still was not convinced in my own mind that that decision was correct so I sought my own legal opinion. They contacted the Electoral Office requesting a copy of the decision. This is the answer we received:
- I wish to confirm previous verbal advice that legal opinions obtained by this office are not made available
to the public.
Dr Burns: FOI.
Mrs BRAHAM: Well! FOI says the member for Johnston. Let me just move on and he might wish he had not. Obviously, I was a little bit disappointed with the fact that the Electoral Office would not give me a response, so I wrote to the Chief Minister as the Electoral Office comes under her department. I requested that she release to me that particular document. I will just read to you her reply - and this, remember, is at a time when we are talking about FOI:
- I am advised the policy the Chief Electoral Officer has adopted of not releasing legal advice provided to him
is consistent with policies and practices operating in other electoral commissions across Australia. Indeed, it is
a generally accepted legal principle that legal advice given is privileged between the provider and the client.
I am also advised that in some state jurisdictions, legal advice is exempted from the provisions of the Freedom
of Information legislation. I regret therefore that in this instance I am not able to assist you with your request.
So much for FOI. Out the window with it before it has even begun. I am very disappointed with the Chief Minister’s reply. It would clarify for me why a legal person said that that poster did not breach the act. We have seen many instances of posters such as this that, in my opinion, have breached the act. We need to clean up the act if it is going to be so freely interpreted that a poster that will mislead voters is allowed. I say to the Chief Minister: I will be interested to look at the discussion paper that is being tabled today to find out what is exempt and what is not exempt and what you are going to do about the situation such as mine which was a simple request to have an explanation.
However, despite of all this - and I do not want to sound as though I am having sour grapes because we did have fun on election day. It is interesting the way at election booths people from all parties gather together and talk and exchange jokes and what have you. There is an element of fun at polling booths.
I am pleased that all of you supported my nomination for the position of Speaker, despite perhaps of the Leader of the Opposition’s gaffe. I realise that he was having a go at the Leader of Government Business but in doing so made people in this House think he was having another go at me. They really are tired of that negative attitude that keeps coming through. I have brushed up on my standing orders and I hope you all do, too. I will try very hard to be impartial in my rulings and I believe last week that I was impartial across the House.
I want to thank those people from around the Territory who contacted me over this difficult period and showed their support. There were people I do not know, have no idea who they are, who sent me e-mails, little cards, and support. It was quite an amazing reaction and that is why I say the CLP really has a lot of ground to make up. It is that support that prompted me to keep going, because, to be quite honest, it would have been very easy to have walked away. But, people out there believe in honesty, they believe in fairness and a fair go for people, and they believe in justice. These are the principles that made me continue.
I want to thank my wonderful band of helpers who stuffed envelopes, walked miles doing letterbox drops, joined me in TV ads, wrote letters to the editor, on election day worked tirelessly - we were up there at 5am, manned the booths, often came back to help for another session. I want to say thank you to the sandwich maker, the muffin maker, the drinks person, all too many to name but you know who you are and you know how much I appreciate what you did for me.
To Robyn, my right hand lady, she has been with me as my electorate officer since 1994 and she has stuck by me no matter what. I apologise to her that she was given some very poor treatment by her former colleagues in that hard November sittings when we were here together. She gives me great service. She would have to be one of the best PR people that you could get and, most of all, she has shown me loyalty and support when I have been down. In particular, my family who suffered also the stress of the last 12 months but were passionate in their support and have completely changed their voting patterns. I doubt whether they – well, I know they won’t ever vote for the CLP again.
To Graeme, my husband, who has always been there beside me, giving me support and the strength that I need, and his love, no matter what. To Michelle, Peter and Sam for their very up-front comments and their ability to make me laugh. When I told them that they were going to be seated behind Denis Burke at the opening of parliament, their remarks were incredible so we had to move them down here, away. I think it is that fun attitude that they can bring into difficult situations that is able to get you through.
To the voters of Braitling in particular, I want to say thank you. You showed your support for me in a way that was just so good. It was from the heart. The CLP lost 26% of their vote in Braitling. They lost 30% of their vote in Araluen and 10% of the vote in Greatorex. If those margins had been applicable in any other part of the Territory, they would have been decimated. They have a lot of hard work to do to catch up. But, I say to the voters of Braitling, I will continue to work for you, to assist you where I can. As I said to someone the other day it is just like business as usual. Nothing has ever stopped. We still have the door open and people coming in and out.
In my role as Speaker, I have thought long and seriously about it, but I think to be really impartial and to be fair to all of you here, it would be wrong of me to participate in debates and put forward my personal opinion unless it impacted greatly upon my electorate. Although there are times I sit in that seat and want to have a say, feel like making a comment, I’ll bite my tongue because it is you and other people making the decisions. It is up to you to put the argument. Unless there is a tied vote, I won’t vote. I guess a tied vote may happen in exceptional circumstances, but I think it is up to you, the people in this Chamber, to make sure that you vote on all matters.
Mr Deputy Speaker, in closing let me say regardless of the past, we have to forget that, get on with life, get on with the job we have been elected to do, don’t dwell on the past any longer. Let’s all move forward together because that is what is important. It is for the future of Territorians, it is for the future of our children that we are here, that we must make sure that we put in the right measures to make sure the Territory still ticks over. I am quite sure that you and I and all the other members of this parliament will make sure it happens.
Debate adjourned.
EXPLANATION OF SPEECH
Mr VATSKALIS (Lands, Planning and Environment)(by leave): Madam Speaker, during Question Time in answer to a question from the member for Greatorex, I used the term ‘Valuer-General’. Instead, I should have used the term ‘Auditor-General’. My apologies to the House.
PERSONAL EXPLANATION
Mr REED (Katherine)(by leave): Madam Speaker, I seek leave to make a personal explanation whereby I have been misquoted.
Mr STIRLING: A point of order, Madam Speaker. I am not aware that the rules existing in the former parliament have changed. That is, a personal explanation goes to the Speaker. They were your rules.
Madam SPEAKER: My understanding is that a personal explanation – Clerk, correct me if I am wrong – that you are supposed to put it in writing to me, then we would agree that you would make a comment on that, and that topic only. That is the way to do it, in writing. I have had no written communication from you.
I think I told you this the other day that if anyone wishes to make a personal explanation, they need to come and tell me what it is about.
Mr REED: Don’t worry about it, Madam Speaker.
MINISTERIAL STATEMENT
Our Plan for Building a Better
Territory Health System
Our Plan for Building a Better
Territory Health System
Mrs AAGAARD (Health, Family and Children’s Services): Madam Speaker, as part of our election platform of building a better Territory, we indicated that health would be one of our key priorities in government and we will be maintaining that commitment. It is very disappointing to become minister for health only to discover the significant underfunding and underservicing of key areas in health and community services evident in so many areas of Territory Health Services and the Territory. Underfunding seems to have been particularly serious in the areas of hospitals, the non-government sector, drug and alcohol services, mental health and community services. The process of discovering this underfunding has been very challenging and indeed alarming. However, today I am not going to go at length into the failures of the former government. I am going to outline the steps that I will be taking to repair and rebuild our health and community sector.
This government will begin by tackling the big health problems that are placing such a strain on our health services today. Key among these problems is the enormous rate of renal disease. Renal disease is extremely costly to treat and is tragic for those suffering and their families. It also has significant cultural and social impacts. For instance, there is the situation whereby many people who come from remote communities to Alice Springs or Darwin for treatment for renal disease will often bring family with them. Some of these people, who have come initially as family support, find themselves with nowhere to live and end up in town camps and can fall into a cycle of alcohol abuse and trouble with the law. This then feeds into the cycle of ill health suffered by our indigenous community.
In Alice Springs, as we have seen recently in the media, many people are living on the river banks in town so as to access renal dialysis treatment. In 1997, the Treasury started ringing the alarm bells about our rising rates of renal disease. At the time, the number of people seeking treatment for renal disease was doubling every four years, and this was placing a huge strain on the Territory Health Services budget. We now know that people suffer from renal disease because of a number of factors, including childhood streptococcus infection, diet, diabetes and high blood pressure. All of these conditions are preventable with early intervention and improved services, including community health services, housing and diet to name but a few. It is a tragedy and a national scandal that over the past 26 years, instead of putting this infrastructure in place, it has been neglected. We are now in a position where we have to deal with an ever increasing number of people suffering chronic disease which was preventable and should have been prevented.
The gap between indigenous and non-indigenous life expectancy increased from 18.7 years in 1981-85 to 22.2 years in 1996-97. Across Australia, the age standardised rate of hospitalisation for indigenous people is 540 per 1000, almost twice as high as the Australian average. In the Territory, the hospital separation rate for indigenous Territorians is 887 people per 1000, compared to just 149 for non-indigenous people. The Territory spends more of its health budget on acute care in our hospitals than any other state or territory. The Australian health expenditure on public hospitals as a proportion of all current health services was 29.2% in 1998-99. In the Territory, this figure sits at a shameful 47%.
In 1997, after Treasury became concerned at how much money was being spent on treating renal disease, staff at Territory Health Services began creating the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy. On 21 April 1999, the former minister for Territory Health Services, the member for Drysdale, made a statement to this House on the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy. As part of that statement he identified the alarming increase in preventable chronic disease in the Northern Territory. He informed the House:
- In the years 1979-1995, 23%, or nearly a quarter of all deaths in the Northern Territory, were due to
kidney disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, ischaemic heart disease or chronic lung disease. These are
the five diseases covered by the PCDS. The proportion of deaths and hospitalisation from chronic diseases
is increasing. Departmental analysis shows that chronic diseases consumed about …
Mr BURKE: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I draw your reference to Standing Order 258 in that it has always been the convention in the past, and it is also in standing orders, that the minister distributes the statement once she commences speaking. That has not occurred, and I ask that they be distributed now.
Madam SPEAKER: The Leader of the Opposition is quite right. We should have the statement delivered to all people in the Chamber.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): Madam Speaker, I am quite happy to take responsibility for that as Leader of Government Business. I should have had it across to the opposition. I will see to it immediately.
Madam SPEAKER: Could you make sure that the Table Office has that copy of the speech before you actually present it. Perhaps the Leader of Government Business could get that done.
Mrs AAGAARD: My apologies, Madam Speaker, I understood that it had been distributed.
- The proportion of deaths and hospitalisation from chronic diseases is increasing. Departmental analysis
shows that chronic diseases consumed about 25% of the hospital budget three years ago and consumes about
40% currently. In five years time, if unchecked, it will consume 56% of the budget.
A major feature in the hospital workload is the increasing complexity of the cases treated. ‘Average weight
per separation’ is the technical term used to assess complexity. From 1993-97, this figure increased by 15%
in Aboriginal inpatients and by 6.5% in non-Aboriginal patients.
In the same speech, the former health minister also went on to outline the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy, which is an excellent document developed by Territory Health Services professionals and is now considered to be the global model for dealing with preventable chronic disease in indigenous communities.
There have been very similar models applied in Queensland and Western Australia, and while it has not been stated that they base their strategies on the Northern Territory Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy, the models they have adopted came after the Territory’s preventable strategy was developed and they bear marked similarities. Canada, too, has expressed interest in the Territory’s Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy and their health services are in the process of implementing a similar strategy there. One of the extraordinary achievements of the people from Territory Health Services who have developed this strategy is that they did so with no development funding from government. This was people who, on top of their pre-existing duties, created a world-class strategy for tackling preventable chronic disease. The former government were justifiably proud of the achievement of their department but, unfortunately, this did not translate into development and implementation funding. This government is committed to ensuring the continuation of funding through the Commonwealth’s Section 100 money, which became available earlier this year.
The Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy developed by THS will be a key plank in our plan to turn around the dire health situation facing indigenous Territorians, and is an integrated approach to dealing with the causes of poor health among our indigenous population. Instead of the traditional scientific reductionist approach to medical science of looking at diseases in isolation, the strategy looks at the conditions creating the poor health outcomes. It also takes into consideration that many of the people fronting up with kidney diseases are suffering from a number of diseases. Conditions such as diabetes and high blood pressure are often associated with renal failure and so cannot be looked at in isolation.
Building from the Preventable Chronic Diseases program, this government will work more closely with indigenous organisations to achieve improved and comprehensive primary health care at a community level. When dealing with indigenous communities, we understand the principle that the process should be driven and owned by the people themselves. This empowered community approach has been historically lacking in many of the dealings between government administrations and indigenous communities throughout our history. We understand that a regime imposed on a community, no matter how well-meaning in intent, will not succeed without the empowerment of that community to make decisions and run programs and hence own the outcomes. The notion that we know what is best for them is a thing of the past. This is not to suggest that we will be abandoning responsibility for providing clinics and other health services, but rather that we will be more focussed on working with communities in partnership to achieve better health outcomes.
I am very pleased to announce to this House that on 28 September, I signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Commonwealth government over their new Primary Health Care Access Program aimed at accessing Commonwealth funding for increasing indigenous people’s access to primary health care services. Through this Memorandum of Understanding, the Territory stands to significantly benefit by the Commonwealth accepting responsibility for funding the shortfall associated with the inaccessibility of its Medicare system to Northern Territory indigenous people. By signing this Memorandum of Understanding, the Territory is poised to receive significantly increased funding for comprehensive primary health care and improved joint planning processes. The only other state or territory jurisdiction to have signed this memorandum is South Australia, which signed up only days before the Territory. By being one of the first jurisdictions to sign the Memorandum of Understanding, we are set to pick up a greatly enhanced share of the program in its first few years.
The Commonwealth has already approved $2.1m per annum in Primary Health Care Access Program funding for five Central Australian zones. The total amount of funding able to be allocated to the Northern Territory health care system in principle is some $60m. The five Central Australian zones to benefit from this injection of funds are Anmatjere, eastern Arrernte-Alyawarra, northern Barkly, Warlpiri, and Luritja/Pintubi. Anmatjere has a population of 1305 people. According to the Central Australian Health Planning Study the current health staffing levels are at only 44% of the levels required for the population. This Memorandum of Understanding for the Primary Health Care Access Program will see funding levels increase significantly. The communities of Tara, Engawala and Laramba have well-organised councils and a strong interest in developing health infrastructure. This funding increase will have a dramatic impact on improving the health services and primary health care in those communities. So, too, in eastern Arrernte-Alyawarra, northern Barkly and Warlpiri which have staffing levels identified as being only 39%, 58% and 53% respectively. This funding injection will enable an increase in the staffing levels required to meet the needs in those communities.
This is a major breakthrough for health services and primary community health care in those areas, and I am hoping that the application of the Primary Funding Health Care Access Program will be expedited to cover many other places of need in regional and remote Northern Territory in the near future. This agreement with the Commonwealth has the potential to really make a difference to our indigenous health outcomes and I hold great expectation that in the near future indigenous Territorians who have contributed so much to our economy, from the pastoral industry to our contemporary cultural exports and tourism industries, will finally have access to health services that the rest of us take for granted.
The importance that we on the side of the House place on health is shared by our federal counterparts. This stands in contrast to those sitting across the Chamber and their federal colleagues. Certainly, it is important to acknowledge the support given by the federal government in their funding allocations for Aboriginal health, and I have already mentioned the MOU in relation to the Primary Health Care Access Program. At the same time, however, it is important to point out that under the present federal government, funding for hospitals has been squeezed to the point where the public hospital system is under threat.
Members will be aware that on 31 July 2000 Labor leaders from all states and territories signed the Medicare Alliance with the federal Labor leader, Kim Beazley. The aim of this alliance is to increase health funding in real terms. The federal Labor Party has now launched a health care policy which, if the Labor Party is elected to government next month, will see a significant increase in federal health funding flowing to the Territory. In fact, I would expect that we would receive at least an additional $6m in Commonwealth funding for our hospitals. This money would be used to bolster our own efforts in important areas such as maternal and child health, palliative care, and mental health services.
Members will be aware of this government’s election commitment to provide radiotherapy services within the Territory, thus enabling patients to be treated in the Territory rather than going interstate. Federal Labor has announced that it would increase funding for radiotherapy services. This funding would complement our commitment to providing a cancer treatment unit at the Royal Darwin Hospital.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker! I actually have a copy of the statement as circulated and I am finding it difficult to keep up with where the minister is actually speaking. So I obviously have an earlier draft.
Madam SPEAKER: There seems to be a need to correct procedures. Apparently there was a draft statement circulated which must have been changed, from which the minister is now reading. In future, you must make sure that whatever you are delivering is the statement you have given to opposition members so they can prepare for it. You cannot give an amended copy in this House.
Mr STIRLING (Leader of Government Business): The copy that I have taken out to the Table Office is in fact the final copy. So my apologies if you have the wrong one. There is one coming.
Mrs AAGAARD: My apologies, Madam Speaker.
Another change we will be seeing under this government is recognition of the illicit drug problem in our society and the implementation of real steps to deal with this problem. I will be forming a Drugs Task Force to investigate the issue of drug use in the Northern Territory. This task force will comprise members from a variety of backgrounds and expertise, from service providers in the non-government sector, to those dealing with people with drug addiction, to researchers, through to former drug users themselves. It will work in consultation with the expert staff of Territory Health Services to consider a range of policy and treatment options.
Drawing on this wide range of expertise, I will then use this information to develop a strategy to combat illicit drug use and its harmful effects to both the individuals and our society as a whole. I have been amazed at the lack of resources for dealing with drug addiction in the Northern Territory. On 18 August this head-in-the-sand approach of dealing with drug addiction in the Northern Territory ceased. I will not ignore the research available, like that of Dr Bridie O’Reilly that showed, among other things, a fourfold increase in the use of amphetamines in the Territory over the past three years. It also showed that we had the highest per capita rate of MS Contin use in Australia.
As part of our election platform, we launched our three-point plan to tackle illicit drugs which combined a policing and medical approach to tackling the problem, as well as empowering the courts to look at sentencing for drug offenders, including compulsory treatment. We pledged to provide treatment and rehabilitation services in Alice Springs and Darwin in a bid to reduce the amount of intravenous drug use in the community. Our plan also includes the provision of effective services for treatment and rehabilitation in Darwin and Alice Springs, to reduce the amount of intravenous drug use in the community. It also includes the implementation of a properly resourced drug prevention strategy including education and family support services, an education campaign directed at our schools, and the utilisation of cinema and television advertising.
Whilst this three-point plan stands as the basis of our drug strategy, the Drug Task Force I will be introducing will be given a wide scope to explore new techniques and processes for tackling our drug problem. We will also be accessing available Commonwealth money so as to be in an informed position when it comes to understanding the scope and type of drug abuse going on in the Territory.
Earlier this year, the former government banned employees of the Northern Territory Public Service from talking to the National Drug and Substance Abuse Inquiry. The National Drug and Substance Abuse Inquiry was a politically bipartisan House of Representatives Committee inquiry which was trying to gain an understanding of type and scope of the drugs issues from around Australia. The Northern Territory was the only jurisdiction in Australia not to cooperate with the inquiry. Luckily, for those who have their houses broken into by drug addicts seeking to satisfy their habits or those affected by drug addiction and misuse in the Northern Territory, we will be taking a vastly different approach.
I will now talk about our plans for hospitals in the Northern Territory. In opposition, we pledged that we would not privatise any of our five public hospitals. We stand by that pledge. We aim to make Royal Darwin Hospital a comprehensive care centre that will deliver the full range of services required by Territorians and which will be a model for all tropical health facilities. Our regional hospitals will not be neglected in achieving this aim. Our regional hospitals will be developed in line with community needs and expectations to cater for both existing need and allowing for growth and expansion in those communities.
In achieving this aim we will implement better medium to long term planning practices for our hospitals’ development rather than the ad hoc funding system we have seen in the past whereby capital works funding is starved over a period of years to be pulled out in an election year. For example, in 1997-98, the former Territory government spent only 1.8% of its capital expenditure on health facilities compared to an all state average of 10.4%. This dropped to 1.7% in 1998-99 compared to an all state average of 14.8%. This is despite the relatively high level of overall capital works spending in the Territory.
There has been an ongoing history of budget underfunding of our hospitals. Over the five year period 1995-96 to 1999-2000, the Royal Darwin Hospital actual expenditure averaged 7.7% per annum more than was budgeted for. For the other Territory hospitals, the result was 6.4% per annum more than was budgeted. This places extreme pressure on the management of our hospitals and on the staff working within them as they strive to meet the budget parameters with negative impacts on staff morale and retention rates.
In February 2000, the Australian Medical Association stated that funding for public hospitals was increasing at barely 4% per annum. They estimated that an annual increase of 8% was required to provide the expected level of care and services. That is the average increase that has actually occurred for Territory hospitals as extra funding was provided towards the end of each financial year to meet costs.
This government is committed to providing best practice medical care in our hospital system in modern and well-maintained hospitals. That means that meeting the capital needs of our hospitals must be on an ongoing and systematic basis, not on an ad hoc one. Territory Health Services is currently implementing a major project in our hospital system to improve efficiency to get money back to the bedside. The department is currently identifying areas of duplication and inefficiency so as to be able to redirect these funds to where they are most needed.
In line with our election commitments, this government will continue with the redevelopment of Royal Darwin and Alice Springs Hospitals currently underway. We will also ensure that our hospitals are able to rely on dedicated funds from the annual capital works program each and every year. Not only will this provide hospitals with greater certainty, it will also provide greater stability to the Territory construction sector. With annual spending of around $200m to $250m on capital works in the Territory budget, it is clearly achievable to dedicate a proportion of this over the next five years to ensure the capital needs of hospitals, as identified by the Health Developments Report, are substantially addressed.
In order to ensure the costings contained in the HDI report are still relevant, this government will produce a comprehensive and funded hospital upgrade plan to meet the projected needs of Territorians. This will be conducted in conjunction with a health equipment audit in our hospitals to identify obsolete and outdated medical and clinical equipment and embark on an immediate upgrade program prioritised to improve clinical outcomes and hospital efficiencies. In addition, I will strongly argue for additional funding from the Commonwealth to meet the higher costs of hospital care in the Territory given the morbidity profiles of our indigenous population. I will also strongly argue to see included in the next Australian Health Care Agreement, due to commence in 2003, specific clauses and funding to address the complex acute morbidity of indigenous Territorians entering our hospitals.
This government will improve the availability and appropriate use of modern communications technology to improve the information available to health workers on patients, access to information by patients themselves and access to expert and specialist advice. I will also be looking at ways of improving access to health information through a Health Direct line and Internet service similar to systems which have been introduced in other jurisdictions which have assisted in a significant reduction in visits to Accident and Emergency departments in the less severe triage categories. We will improve the ability of the health system to train, recruit and hold medical and specialist medical staff, nurses and health workers.
This government believes that consumers of health care have a right to information and choice about the services and treatments available to them, and a right to information about the success of medical interventions and the performance of all health care providers in hospitals and medical practices. This assists individuals to take more responsibility for their own health through better information and more active involvement in decision making about their health care. In conjunction with a federal Labor government, we will work constructively towards the introduction of an electronic health record. Labor will cooperate with the Commonwealth to ensure national standards are accommodated.
Madam Speaker, I have used this opportunity to outline some of our vision for Territory Health Services in our hospital system. After becoming minister, despite the shortfalls and government neglect that many of our health services suffer, I was delighted to discover that we have a very strong foundation upon which to build Territory Health Services into a first class service. That strong foundation is the dedicated team of people at Territory Health Services who have developed enormous expertise on health and community services in the Northern Territory over many years. I look forward to working closely with my department and with the non-government sector to build a great Territory health system.
Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly take note of the statement.
Mr DUNHAM (Drysdale): Madam Speaker, I suppose I should start by saying that I am very pleased that the statement has been presented in such a way because essentially what it is is a plagiarised patchwork quilt from a variety of policies that were well and truly in place before this member even considered entering politics. There is a very long history to this and the very strong foundations that have been built, have been built as a very good legacy which has been left to this government.
I notice that it was sprinkled with a few ‘it’s terrible that the neglect has been in place for so long, over so many years’ and that type of rhetoric. I assume what has happened is a variety of areas in the department have sent up statements that have been thrown together into one statement. Somebody has done an edit on them and said, ‘You have to put some nasty things about the previous government and some good things about the potential for an incoming Labor federal government and there you have a speech’. Well, you don’t. I think the foundation document really should have been Labor’s policy. If you walk through this document, which it is my intention to do now, you will see that with a brief critique in some cases it actually argues against itself, and in many cases, the minister is arguing from a point of acceptance of briefing rather than looking to putting her own imprimatur and standards on this and that this is a potential problem for those opposite. If they want to be in autopilot mode, they should be a bit careful about making sure the things that are in their political speak and their platforms and their elections actually turn into action and documents.
Just a quick word on process. I did speak personally to the minister last night who told me I would have this by e-mail at 8 o’clock last night. I didn’t, in fact, have it this morning so it was e-mailed to a variety of people not including myself. I did get a copy this morning and as the Parliamentary Record will now show, those of us on this side did not actually get a copy of this statement until half way through, and in any event the one we had was an abridged one. The bit that was put in was mostly political rhetoric, I see, with the additional of the radiotherapy services which is a $15m promise and which is something I would like to touch on as we go through this.
I will finish with a couple of things, given that I have a reasonable amount of time. First is some advice and the second is some questions, seeing as how the matter of the federal election has been intruded into this statement, that the minister might like to answer in her rejoinder closing debate. I have several questions here that have come out of the Labor policy of yesterday - it was very recent if not yesterday. I am sure that given that they are very strong about their relationship, not only with the Labor government but also very enthusiastic about the potential for Kim Beazley to be Prime Minister, that they will have answers for these questions.
If we start walking through the statement that the members now have, we probably should look at the first page. ‘I am not going to go to any length about the failures of the former government,’ and then continually spatter the speech with them, but let’s talk about the key issues in the paper.
There is an allegation when we get straight into renal failure that people come into town, have nowhere to live and end up in town camps. Well, my recollection is that the raison d’tre of many of these town camps is for visitors coming from remote communities who are in town for a time limited period who would prefer to live in a milieu that is more comfortable for them than the mainstream town. It is for that reason that there are some 19 of these enclaves in Alice Springs alone, and they are the formal ones. The informal ones would probably total up to another five or six. So, to denigrate town camps as a place where people from bush come in and live while they are supporting the unfortunate member who is in end stage renal failure shows a lack of understanding of town camps. I have some problems with how town camps are structured and with how they are managed. But essentially, town camps provide an accommodation option for Aboriginal people coming into urban settings and for them to be put in a mode here of ‘end up in town camps and fall into the cycle of alcohol abuse and trouble with the law,’ possibly is the sort of thing that even organisations like Tangentyere and Aboriginal Development Foundation might have some difficulty with that sort of aspersion.
The allegation - and I did see it in the media too, because I think it was sparked by a letter from an Aboriginal organisation to some Senate inquiry – ‘in Alice Springs we have recently seen many people living on the riverbank in town so as to access renal dialysis treatments’. I would ask the minister if she could tell me the number of people - ‘many’ I assume being several or more – who are living on the riverbanks in town and accessing renal dialysis treatments. I did investigate it myself as minister, and found the allegation to be untrue. There are a couple of options here: firstly, it is true and I was misinformed; second is it is untrue and the minister in her rejoinder can retract it; and third, perhaps since I left the job, which is now a couple of months ago and her coming in, this has now become a phenomena. I would like to know which of the three it is.
The statement then goes on to talk about that in 1997 the Treasury started ringing alarm bells about our rising rates of renal disease. This is just a nonsense and it is my hope that Treasury have not written this statement or had any input into it and I would be very surprised if people in Territory Health Services are informing the minister that it was Treasury that discovered this problem with renal disease. That they knew about it, did not know about it until some boffin in the Treasurer’s department said, ‘Look, you have a really big problem with renal disease’.
Mr Kiely interjecting.
Mr DUNHAM: You will have an opportunity to speak, my friend. In your opportunity to speak perhaps this is the issue you could address. It is obviously something that has sparked your interest and if you want to interject about the Territory Health Services only understanding about renal disease in 1997, I think you are being a bit critical of your former colleagues in a way that is untrue.
That is not true and it is not true on the basis that I worked for a variety of ministers in CLP governments since about 1988 and it is something that is well known to us. The cost of renal failure and the social and other issues are well known to us. There are some of us in this House who knew the former member for Arafura very well and I am one of them. We know the tragedy of end stage renal failure with that particular gentleman and we know the issues relating to his kidney transplant. I think it is a bit foolish for a minister to come in here and tell a parliament that sat with that particular member that it was something we did not know about until 1997 when we were told by Treasury officials. Indeed, if one goes to the Public Accounts Committee report which is dated 1996 - and I think you may have even been on the committee, Madam Speaker, I can’t recall - but that certainly predates that and it, too, is knowledgeable about this phenomena.
Then we get into the Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy; this is a great strategy. All of the conditions prevented with end stage renal failure blah, blah, blah, and I quote from the minister’s statement:
It is a tragedy and a national scandal that over the past 26 years instead of putting this infrastructure in place
it has been neglected.
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. That particular sentence is wrong on a couple of accounts. In the first place those of us who have been in the Northern Territory since self-government will recall it happened in 1978 and if you are any good at maths that gets you to 23 years. Also, those of you who were here after that would recall that there were some things the Commonwealth took some time to hand over and one of them was health. If you go back to that time - and here is a piece of ministerial officer advice for the minister - talk to people who span that period. Talk to Dr Hargraves, talk to Dr Alan Walker, talk to some of these people whose practice spanned that 20 years and you would be stunned at how much has happened. Go back 20 years and look at the practice of health in this place. As a young child I grew up in Katherine. I can remember having a toothache and having to come to Darwin to go to the dentist. I suppose I am an old person, I am in my 40s, but if you go back 40 years you will see that infrastructure was much, much more deficient than what we had 20 years ago. Go back to 60 years or 80 years to Dr Clyde Fenton and you will see that the growth in this place in our human resource, our technology, our physical infrastructure, our hospitals has been absolutely remarkable. It has been astonishing.
When the minister talks about ‘it was not really the government, it was others’, I am quite happy to acknowledge that, quite happy to acknowledge that. We have had some really good people in our health sector. We have had some remarkable advocates who have been wage and salary earners in the main, who have done work above and beyond the call of duty. Certainly, the physical structure of the Katherine Hospital, which was originally built on the current site by Dr Clyde Fenton back in 1935 I think, and the modification certainly with paediatric and the Jack Roney Wing came with great input from Dr Short and Dr Scattini, two local GPs who were on the hospital board and were practitioners in the hospital, I am quite happy to give those accolades. It is not my intention to say all this stuff happened because of the government, but neither is it true to say all this stuff happened in spite of the government or despite the government, because that is just foolish.
If you look at the Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy which is this portion of the speech, we talk about that which was preventable and which should have been prevented. The question for the minister, and this will plague her through her entire time, is should it be prevented by the government? Because the issue with preventable chronic diseases is that it is incumbent on all of us. On the last occasion I spoke about this, I spoke about the member for Arnhem - I was being pilloried for having ‘blood on my hands’ if I recall at the time - and I said that there is something we all could do. For instance, we could register to donate our organs, that is something we could do for people with end stage renal failure. The Aboriginal leaders and people of the ilk of the member for Arnhem could lose weight, because he is a leader among his people and his physical condition is something that he could prevent. Myself, also, if I am a leader among Aboriginal people. The point at that time was that it was seen as an unfair call on him, it was out of bounds, it was really naughty and then lo! and behold, he went to see his doctor who said, ‘Jack, you should lose weight, mate. That is half your problem’.
When we talk about preventable chronic disease …
Ms LAWRIE: A point of order, Madam Speaker. The member for Drysdale was referring to another member by his name.
Madam SPEAKER: He does know better than that, don’t you?
Mr DUNHAM: Madam Speaker, I was being familiar with the member for Arnhem …
Madam SPEAKER: I know, but he still has a position in this House.
Mr DUNHAM: Okay, and I quoted ‘Blank, you could lose a bit of beef’.
Going on to this particular strategy, it is something that involves us all. If the government is saying in this statement that preventable chronic disease is something which should have been prevented and it is our call, they do not understand what the strategy is, and they certainly do not understand some of the rhetoric that we get into later about this has to involve local people, and they have to own the system. This is page 7 of the minister’s statement: ‘When dealing with Aboriginal communities we understand the principle that the process should be driven and owned by the people themselves’. Yes, and the government has a big role to play – true. It has a big role to play as a funder, as an educator, as a researcher but, to drive the preventable chronic diseases …
Dr Burns: You never implemented it.
Mr DUNHAM: … and a commentator, Madam Speaker, and I hope some of the commentary will come later on.
We talk about Territory heath expenditure as sitting at a shameful 47%. This is quite a strange speech because it goes from one side of saying you underfunded them, ah, but you found the money, and other states are funding it at this level, and you are funding at a shameful greater level. Well, this is a bit of a strange line to follow. We often get criticised for spending too much in health, the health budget has blown out, you gave them more money at the end of the year, and then we are told we are being frugal and tight-fisted. I suggest you have to work out what it is you are attacking us for. I stand entirely by the quotes, by the way, the quotes that we talked about. The Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy was debated in this parliament. It has remarkable adherence from practitioners and researchers, and others in the Territory Health Services.
It has a good heritage that has been discussed over a long period of time and, again, if you go to most practitioners, it was something they did innately. A lot of clinicians in communities understood innately the Preventative Chronic Diseases Strategy. What was done was it was put into a core document and it happened about the time that Peter Plummer took over as the steward of the department. I do not attribute the strategy to him but what I will say is that at about that time, we distilled our thinking into such a way that this came out as a priority strategy that we would implement and adhere to.
Its origins go way back past that, and again I will call up the PAC report that was done circa 1996. There is a diagram in there that empirically demonstrates the Preventative Chronic Diseases Strategy and causes for the high rates of hospitalisation and acute care for Aboriginal people.
Dr Burns: So the PAC did it?
Mr DUNHAM: This is a difficult concept to get through to them. What I am trying to demonstrate is this is something that was known by many people. It has many authors, that it was a very powerful and innate strategy within the Territory Health Service, that it was understood widely by many practitioners and put into informal practice by them. GAMUT was one of the programs, GAIMS was another program, and while I am not going to stand in this parliament and claim authorship and sponsorship of it, neither will I say that it was something that happened totally devoid of any government involvement.
Then we have this terrible allegation that the people, the extraordinary people from Territory Health, did it on top of their pre-existing duties and created a world class program. Well, let’s get this straight: what we said is this is an innate part of all our jobs, and it is a priority task for government, and it is a task that should be incumbent on all of us, and it should already be embedded in your duties. So, in the first call we had was do that audit, make sure it is embedded in your duties. Make sure if you are the clinic sister that some of this is part of your job. Make sure that when you are looking to prepare your estimates that you put it in.
That is a pretty good start, because what happened is we had a very generous Commonwealth government come to power that was quite happy to look to these as priority items, unlike their Labor predecessors who neglected this place, starved this place and were entirely ignorant about what happened up here. So, that was a pretty good strategy. The Commonwealth Section 100 money is enormous money, when we looked at approaching the Commonwealth - and again you can go back to the PAC report. In that report it said that our underfunding through MBS, Medical Benefits Schedule, and PBS amounted to something like $50m. That was a really potent document to go and slam on the desks of federal ministers. We were very lucky because we had federal minister Dr Michael Wooldridge. Now, Dr Michael Wooldridge came here over a dozen times as the shadow Aboriginal Affairs minister, and he came here often as the Health minister. I go back long enough to have seen his predecessor, Dr Carmen Lawrence, and Mr Richardson and Mr Howe, and I will make a little commentary on all of them. I do not think Brian Howe ever came here as health minister. I don’t think he ever set foot in this place. He was very dismissive of anything to do with private health, and he was entirely focused on the hospital system.
We believed that there had been a bit of a light when head kicker, Richo, came to power. We got on pretty well with him at conferences, and he did make a trip here, and it should be put on the Parliamentary Record - Minister Richardson did come to this place. I was working for the then health minister, Mike Reed, in Katherine, and Mr Richardson came to Katherine. He spent two days there and only had a half an hour at a cocktail welcome, the community thing, to speak to the Territory health minister. He did go and visit some town camps, and he was so disgusted when he visited an illegal town camp and found there was not a tap there, that he organised with Mayor Jim Forscutt to have a tap put on. I am not sure if the tap is still there, but I think it is one of those Labor monuments that should be put into their history, because that was the sole savvy of this bloke’s skill. He obviously knew nothing about water borne diseases, he knew nothing about the difficulties in having people living it tough in illegal camps as opposed to the already provided town camps.
Carmen Lawrence: we were pretty keen to see her there too because she had been a state health minister and we thought, ‘Ah! somebody who is not a captive of the bureaucrats in Canberra. This will be good. We will be able to talk to this lady’, and we tried and tried and tried to track her down. In fact, we finally caught her in her electorate office in Fremantle, and I think it was by some trick of, again, then health minister Reed, to actually catch her. We had pretty good relationships with other health ministers, including Labor health ministers. I can remember talking to the Queensland health minister and saying, ‘Look, how do you how do you actually get to talk to her?’. He said, ‘Look, you can’t, she is hiding. She has total siege mentality, doesn’t want the health portfolio, is hiding until she can get something big like being the Prime Minister of Australia.’
So, when people want to go back in history, they should remember that you cannot just dismiss the actions of government. If you dismiss the actions of government – if you look at…
Members interjecting.
Mr DUNHAM: Madam Speaker, if there are many more contributors to this, they should do so one at a time, because what happens is I will start speaker louder and louder and it becomes difficult for people to actually follow the tape.
Where we were was talking about some of the things that happen by government - by government - and while I will say there are other players involved, you cannot say that the inroads in health have happened totally devoid of government, and some of the calls in this particular document even say despite government.
I can remember working for a health minister and he got a call from - and I have recounted this in the parliament and I will do so again - a paediatrician late at night who had a very ill child he was treating and he talked to him about a thing called HiB, Haemophillis influenza type B. He talked about how this disease could be eradicated, there was going to be a new capacity for it to be eradicated with inoculation on the market, and the matter was being debated in an economic way about the cost of this. That health minister was instrumental in eradicating the disease, the highest incidence in the world of which was around Alice Springs among Aboriginal people. So, sometimes it does not hurt to involve government because, essentially, you need resources and resources come out of things like budgets. Are they going to come out of the mini-budget we are going to do next week? That is why it is important to interrogate these budgets because we need to know if this stuff is not rhetoric that it is going to be in the budget.
We need to know that in November, when we turn up and we read papers saying, ‘We think drug strategies are really important, we are going to give them money and chronic diseases’, we want to see the cash. Show me the money. What we want to see in November is the capacity for us to interrogate the words that are coming out of the mouths of those opposite and see whether we are still on election mode, are we still talking rhetoric, or whether we are getting to cut to the chase and getting to the fact that it is going to actually turn into programs and money.
The business about community involvement - yep, I agree with that. Not only is it in many statements to this House, not only is it in how the department, Territory Health Services, does business, it is in the former Chief Minister’s Foundations for Our Future statement. It is not something, as I said, where somebody has hit a keyboard and cobbled together some well-sounding words. When we get to the five Central Australia zones, this is big money - $2.1m from the Primary Health Care Access Program for five Central Australia zones. That sort of money can make some big inroads, it can buy some really good human resources. The minister went on to talk about eastern Arrernte-Alyawarra, northern Barkly, Warlpiri, and - what is Luitju/Pintubi in here, unless the spelling has changed, is Luritja/Pintubi.
She also talks about the communities: ‘… Tara, Engawala and Laramba have well-organised councils and a strong interest in developing health infrastructure’. My question for her is: ‘Says who? Says who?’ Because what the minister for health has to do is go to these places. In fact, I have been there. I think it is incumbent on her when she starts to talk about Aboriginal health, she starts to talk about community involvement, communication, consultation, all that stuff, you actually have to go there. You have to get into a light plane, fly out in the storms, land on the dirt strip, walk through the mud, and go and talk to the well-organised council at Tara. Until you do that, you are going to be held captive in this building.
The fine words that are in here may be true, they may not. We may have a lot of people with end stage renal failure receiving dialysis, living in the bed of the Todd River. The communities of Tara, Engawala and Laramba may well have well-organised councils, they may be absolutely ecstatic about developing health infrastructure. Go and have a look, see what it is about. And when you do put that funding increase in, make sure that you audit it. That is why we had the Health Gains Unit which is not mentioned in the speech at all. But the Health Gains Unit is where we are going. We have to make sure that when we put money into a place, we can measure that there is a direct nexus between the cash going in and better health outcomes. Unless you can, all you are doing is using the money to pay lip service to rhetoric.
Many on this side of the House are interested in your drugs policies. We have read several of them, and we have heard your rhetoric. We have also heard, for instance, the interjections from people like the new member for Karama, who was saying, ‘Shame, you have nothing’. I think there are a couple of issues. One quote: ‘I have been amazed by the lack of resources for dealing with drug addiction in the Northern Territory’. Have you been to the AIDS Council yet? Have you been to Banyan House yet? Have you been to the sobering-up shelter yet? Have you been to detox yet? Have you been to a ACOCA yet? Have you been to Congress yet? Have you been to any of the recipients of the federal government’s Tough on Drugs money? Have you been to Danila Dilba and looked at the program they put in with the Commonwealth’s money?
When you have done that, you can talk about the lack or otherwise of resources. But you must go there. Do not rely on a report from somebody who has a vested interest saying, ‘Minister, we do not have much money and we need more or people are going to die’, because I tell you, you are going to hear that every day. Every day, everybody will tell you they need more money – everybody! So it does not matter which sector you are dealing with in health, whether you are talking to researchers, or practitioners in the acute setting, or to people in the field or the non-government sector, they are all going to tell you they need more money. I do not think that is a good thing to parrot that back and say there is no money. You actually have to go and have a look and benchmark that.
When you talk about the head-in-the-sand approach dealing with drug addiction, I dispute that entirely. Not only …
Dr Burns: It is minuscule. That is what you said.
Mr DUNHAM: You may say it is minuscule. I will pick that up for the Parliamentary Record. Dr Burns, the member for …
Dr Burns: No, I did not say it was minuscule. Your ex-Police Minister said that, and your ex-Chief Minister.
Mr DUNHAM: No, it is on the record. You said it was minuscule.
Dr Burns: Yes, it is on the record, that is what they said.
Madam SPEAKER: Order!
Mr DUNHAM: Madam Speaker, it is really important we pick this rhetoric up. I disagree with him. I think he is entirely wrong. The member for Johnston believes the drug problem is minuscule. I disagree with him. I think it is one of those things where it has been used as a political plaything, and it has never ever been recognised by the previous government as minuscule. Indeed, we have …
Mr Henderson: Read the Hansard.
Mr DUNHAM: Oh, it is in Hansard? He said it is minuscule, and that is why I am glad I picked that up. I am interested to know whether, given the rhetoric about people have to own the problem and be part of it etcetera, if you are an Aboriginal person in the bush, whether the program of having compulsory treatment will work, I would like to see a little more about that. I think there are some difficult problems with compulsory treatment.
I like the idea about education campaign directed to our schools and utilisation of cinema and TV advertising. I need an assurance that DARE will continue. I want to hear that out of the words out of the government. DARE is a great program and I want to hear that it will continue. I want to hear that Life Education will continue.
The other thing that is also not true in the statement and should be pointed out: ‘The Territory is the only jurisdiction in Australia not to cooperate with the inquiry’. That is untrue. There is a substantial submission that was put in, a substantial submission. I guarantee that if you look at the other states’ submissions, they will pale into insignificance against ours. Not only did we cooperate with the House of Representatives committee of inquiry, but I gave evidence. So, do I know it is a lie? Yes, I know it is a lie, because I actually swore, I gave evidence to the committee. Their problems with Hansard was such that it is not all fully recorded, but it is there for those who want to check whether that is, in fact, the truth or not.
Time precludes me from going further on this, but we will have other speakers from this side, and hopefully, some more opportunities to debate the important issue of health, given that it has been said – and the putative Prime Minister, Mr Beazley said it again – that the health, education, jobs are the important things. You cannot say it is important and then not talk about it, not answer letters and not do it. So, let us see the bona fides here.
The long diatribe about hospital funding – I think the new minister has been seduced by acute sector with the bells, whistles, lights, and hi-tech gear. The whole idea that we have to have more money go to the bedside, I dispute. We have to get more money to the community. It must go to preventative programs. It must go into programs that prevent rather than treat. The long diatribe that is in there about the good hospital system – which I agree with is good – should be moderated in terms of your priorities. Your priorities must be community-based, prevention-based programs that look to keep people out of hospital, not in hospital and being treated.
I will leave it there, Madam Speaker, only by virtue of the fact that I have run out of time. But I will be seeking to put on the record some questions about the federal government’s Medicare Alliance, and I would ask the minister to make some calls and provide answers to that before she sits down.
Dr BURNS (Johnston): Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to respond to the minister’s statement. As outlined in my maiden speech, I have a long-standing interest in supporting improvements in the health and wellbeing of Territorians. I am proud to affirm all elements of the minister’s statement on health. That statement reaffirms, once again, the priority that this government – this Labor government – gives to improving the health and welfare of Territorians. It is in stark contrast to the scandalous legacy of neglect, incompetence and ill health, left to the people of the Northern Territory by the previous CLP government. I will detail it.
Let me illustrate what that terrible legacy of – I call it the ‘Deadly Territory’. This is what they left us. It is sad state of NT health bequeathed from the CLP government. The release of this publication here, which is the Territory Health Services publication, Mortality in the Northern Territory, 1979-1997, occurred early in 2000 without fanfare or publicity. That was in stark contrast to the publication of the previous publication, which was Morbidity and Mortality in the Northern Territory, 1979-1991. I can well remember Ray Norman, who was the Chief Executive Officer of Territory Health Services at that stage, releasing that document and going through it and publicly showing what the figures meant. This publication arrived anonymously, and it was not until I went through the tables and what was contained in here that I understood why it had never been released publicly and why it had probably been sat on in the minister’s office for quite some time.
From the former CLP government’s perspective, the reason for the lack of publicity surrounding this publication here is understandable, because it is a damning indictment on the way in which health of Northern Territorians, both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, has deteriorated over the past 18 years. Tragically, in terms of Aboriginal health, this publication does not report any dramatic improvement. In most major disease categories such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes and renal disease, injury and poisoning, there are continuing and unacceptably high death rates. Many of these rates are between twice and 10 times the Australian rate. In many other disease categories, there were further increases in Aboriginal death rates. Without wanting to diminish the appalling state of NT Aboriginal health and the need to effectively address this unacceptable situation, this publication here contains dramatic and alarming revelations relating to the health of the non-Aboriginal population in the Northern Territory. I am going to detail it now.
NT non-Aboriginal death rates in the 1991-95 period are far greater than the Australian population in crucial disease categories such as lung cancer; 30% higher for non-Aboriginal men and almost double for non-Aboriginal women when you compare it to the Australian rate. Diabetes: 40% higher for non-Aboriginal men when compared to the non-Aboriginal Australian rate. Respiratory disease: 30% higher for non-Aboriginal men and 60% higher for non-Aboriginal women. Injury: 50% higher for non-Aboriginal men and 30% higher for non-Aboriginal women. Infectious disease: over twice the rate for non-Aboriginal men compared to the Australian rate. So those are the death rates. In summary, they are much higher in major disease categories for non-Aboriginal Territorians than compared to the Australian rate.
There are also trends in this document. There has been a consistent increase in Northern Territory non-Aboriginal death rates in a whole range of major disease categories since 1979 when compared to the Australian population. For example, diabetes: in the 1981-85 period, the NT non-Aboriginal male death rate from diabetes was 70% lower than the Australian male rate. However, in 1991-95, it was 40% higher than the Australian male death rate, so it has gone from 70% lower to 40% higher. Although the absolute numbers are relatively small, this represents a relative increase of over 100% even when increases in the Australian male death rate have been accounted for in relation to diabetes.
Respiratory disease: in the 1981-1985 period the NT non-Aboriginal female death rate for respiratory disease was 20% higher than the Australian female rate. In 1991-95, it was 60% higher than the Australian female death rate.
Cardiovascular disease: in the 1986-90 period to the 1991-95 period the NT non-Aboriginal male death rate increased by 15% and also recorded a 30% increase relative to the Australian male death rate which was declining during that period. Optimistically, it could be said that any previous decline in the NT non-Aboriginal death rate between 1981-90 for cardiovascular disease has stalled against the background of a sharp decline nationally.
So we are talking about non-Aboriginal Territorians and the appalling state of health, figures from your own report over a long period, that is an indictment against the mismanagement and the neglect of your government over a very long period. Although the overall death rates for non-Aboriginal males and non-Aboriginal females in the Northern Territory are 6% and 13% lower than the corresponding death rates in 1996-97, these overall lower death rate figures for the non-Aboriginal population tend to hide the underlying and alarming situation in many of the top ranked major disease categories as outlined above.
In summary, yes, our non-Aboriginal death rates when you take them in toto are less than the Australian rate, but there are many reasons for that and it is actually hiding some of these factors that I have mentioned before, so I wouldn’t be taking comfort from that. Notwithstanding this effect, excess non-Aboriginal death rates in most of the other top ranked major disease categories are cause for great concern. This state of affairs is a damning indictment of the way the CLP allowed the Northern Territory to become ‘Deadly Territory’ for Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people alike.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker! The member claimed that he was quoting from a document, and I would just like to know whether the quote has ended because I can’t recall those words in that document.
Dr BURNS: This is my interpretation of the tables that are in that document, because there is very little commentary there. I will stand by my interpretation of them. I will stand by it.
They have failed to effectively address Aboriginal health issues and they have also neglected to safeguard the health of other Territorians. Now there has been a change in government, we are committed to rein in this excessive mortality. Labor pledges to effectively address chronic disease health issues confronting Territorians by providing leadership through a professional, energetic and committed approach outlined by our health minister. We commend the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy, however unlike the CLP we will actually implement it. Now …
Mr Dunham: With Commonwealth money. Where do you think you will get it from, you goose?
Madam SPEAKER: Order! Member for Drysdale.
Dr BURNS: Now there was some mention about who should take credit for the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy. Not once did I hear the name of Professor John Mathews mentioned. Not once did I hear the name of Dr Wendy Hoy or Dr Tarun Weeramanthri who were all key players in the development of the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy. The Kidney Disease Research Project, which grew out of Dr Hoy’s work, is actually an example of how, with funding from the private sector and with funding from the non-government sector and with little help from the government, there can be very positive outcomes obtained in a very short time.
I was a member of the Preventable Chronic Diseases Committee that used to meet at Health House over about a year or 18 month period and my opinion was it just flapped around, it didn’t really have a clear direction from government. We were not sure whether we were reporting to the health minister or the CEO of Health and there was just a lack of leadership, and that is going to contrast with what this government is going to do.
Madam SPEAKER: Member for Johnston, would you please talk to me.
Dr BURNS: Yes, Madam Speaker. I will, however, commend the former government for funding cardiac rehab, although that in itself is still awaiting implementation, but that was a positive step.
Mr Baldwin: Well, get on with it, you mob.
Dr Lim: You’re in government now. Do something about it.
Madam SPEAKER: Order!
Dr BURNS: Well, we will. We are. Now, onto illicit drugs. Apart from maintaining that the illicit drug problem in Darwin was minuscule – that’s the former government – even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the former government completely ignored …
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker. It cannot be demonstrated that the former government said that the problem was minuscule and I believe that he is defaming government in such a way he should do it by way of substantive motion.
Madam SPEAKER: I don’t think there is a point of order there. The member for Johnston, please remember you are talking to me.
Dr BURNS: However, the former government, I believe, completely ignored the value of drug treatment and rehabilitation to redress this issue. I quote the former police minister when talking to Fred McCue on 17 January this year:
- We’re tough on drugs. We won’t have taxpayers paying for methadone programs to sustain the habits
of drug addicts.
However, I know that what is euphemistically called the Pain Clinic, where there was some methadone available for those with a drug problem, albeit for a very short period, was underfunded, understaffed, there was no specialist doctor, neither was there a psychologist there to assess patients. It was a mess. I was on the Schedule 8 committee for a period of six years and I know what the former government was not doing in the area of illicit drugs.
The truth of the matter is that the former CLP government allowed the prescription of morphine to spiral out of control in the Territory over many years, and for ever increasing amounts of this morphine to be diverted to addicts. The lack of an effective CLP drug policy spawned large scale illicit narcotic use, mainly morphine prescribed at six times the average of southern states and diverted to drug addicts. My own estimates, based on Health Insurance Commission figures, put the illicit morphine trade in Darwin between about 1998 and 1999 and possibly into 2000 at $10m per year street value of the amount of morphine that was diverted. So here we go. This is morphine that is primarily paid for by the taxpayer being diverted onto the streets of Darwin.
Mr Dunham: Illegally provided by doctors. Is that your allegation? Doctors illegally provided 10 million bucks of…
Dr BURNS: This all occurred under your stewardship. This all occurred at taxpayers expense through the Commonwealth Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, and because it was through the PBS, I once again estimated that there was a cost to the Australian taxpayer of somewhere between $300 000 and $400 000 per year. This was a problem ignored by the CLP government until the Health Insurance Commission, a Commonwealth body, intervened in 1999. Everyone knew about it. However, it is not a problem that will be ignored by this government, and our health minister has outlined how we will effectively address this problem.
Mr Dunham: No, she hasn’t.
Dr BURNS: Yes, she has.
Madam Speaker, returning to the Preventable Chronic Disease Strategy, we will effectively use funding under the Primary Health Care Access Program, or PHCAP, to support primary health care on Aboriginal communities. This will reduce the number of Aboriginal people currently being admitted to Territory hospitals because of inadequate primary health care at the community level.
Our health minister has also affirmed our commitment to providing best practice and adequate infrastructure in our hospitals. I applaud her commitment to produce a comprehensive and funded hospital upgrade plan. You will find out about the dollars.
Madam Speaker, in summary, I heartily endorse the statement made by our minister for health. It clearly sets out the strategies by which this government proposes to effectively improve the health and wellbeing of Territorians, and there will be no more ‘Deadly Territory’ for us.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker. I would ask, under Standing Order 256, that the member table the document he quoted from, because there is some confusion about his quote ends and starts.
Madam SPEAKER: Could you table the document? Will you table the document?
Mr DUNHAM: He must.
Madam SPEAKER: Is that your only copy?
Dr BURNS: That is my own copy; I would like to get it back.
Madam SPEAKER: You will get a copy from the Table Office staff.
Dr LIM (Greatorex): Madam Speaker, I believe that it is very appropriate and right that I start at the very back of her statement where she said she was delighted to discover that the Northern Territory has a very strong foundation upon which to build Territory Health Services into a first class service and that a strong foundation was the dedicated team of people at Territory Health Services. I could not agree with her more. I believe that our Territory health professionals are second to none in the country. They work very, very hard and it is because of their professionalism and their dedication that we have such a good health service in the Territory. Having worked with Territory professionals across the Territory, from north to south, but especially in Central Australia, I take my hat off to them. Their dedication is fantastic, the hours that they work and the hardship that they have to undergo to look after patients who continually pour through the front doors is just remarkable. I commend the minister for also congratulating the staff there.
I want to go through the minister’s statement carefully and just talk about a few of the comments that she made. In particular, I draw her attention to page 3 where she said that in Alice Springs she saw recently in the media that people were living in the river banks. I was particularly interested in that issue; there was indeed a photograph printed in the Centralian Advocate of Aboriginal people sitting on the banks of the Todd River claiming to also be attending renal dialysis.
I spoke to Territory Housing at that time asking why these people were not housed in appropriate accommodation as Territory Housing has accommodation set aside for renal dialysis patients. In the following investigation it was found, and this is through direct interviews with the people who were sitting on the river bank, that they were indeed housed within Territory Housing, and the Minister for Housing should know that, too, if he were adequately briefed by his department. Those people who were photographed had chosen to go to the Todd River, where they were meeting with other people, to await their transportation to the renal dialysis unit. That is the fact of the story. So, there are no people living in the Todd River as you suggested in your speech. I hope you will take time to look into that and rectify that comment in your statement.
You talk about renal disease and that it is caused by childhood streptococcal infections, diet, diabetes, and high blood pressure. These are types of diseases that people suffer through lifestyle choices. Now, it is lifestyle choices because ...
Mr Kiely interjecting.
Dr LIM: The member for Sanderson continues to interrupt and I look forward to hearing his debate. More than likely he will not stand up to debate because, as you know, empty vessels do make the most noise. However, let’s proceed.
Lifestyle choices are things that we choose for ourselves. Sure, there are instances where people may not be able to access levels of accommodation that you and I enjoy, but that is another story and I would love to hear what the Minister for Housing would have to say about the choice of housing for our indigenous people.
Lifestyle choices means that we have the opportunity to correct some of those if we wish to, if we knew how to and if we had the means to do so. I believe that the former Territory government had put many things in place to assist many people, including our indigenous population, to do that. It is not an easy task and I look forward to the success rate that the current minister for health will have in her coming years. Of course, when you compare what we have in the Northern Territory with what is happening interstate, you cannot say that there is a national scandal about what has happened in the Northern Territory in the last 26 years. We heard the member for Drysdale speak about how long we have had self-government. Since self-government, the health facilities and health provision in the Territory has increased significantly.
It is rubbish to say that the CLP government provided nothing. All you have to do is just compare what we had at the start of self-government to what we have today. The hospitals in Darwin, Alice Springs, Tennant Creek and Katherine are all reasonably new hospitals and the current upgrading of those hospitals are indications that the former government was very committed to the services that have been provided for Territorians.
When the minister commented about hospital separation for indigenous Territorians being so much higher than the non-indigenous population, she fails to recognise that apart from the great mix of illnesses that our indigenous population suffer from, that trauma contributes a very high percentage of hospitalisations and if not hospitalisation, at least admissions into emergency departments for services. Trauma is a fact of life, unfortunately, for many of our indigenous people. In Alice Springs, for instance, where I know a lot about, it is a common topic of discussion among health professionals that in summer we have many indigenous people presenting to the emergency department because of alcohol and trauma, and in winter it is alcohol and burns, which is another form of trauma. That is the unfortunate pattern of behaviour.
How can we change that? That is the vexed issue. I believe that our previous health ministers have addressed that in the best way they possibly can within the resources that we have. When we spend 47% of the health budget on Aboriginal care it is a significant commitment by the former government towards looking after our indigenous population in the Territory. You cannot say that the Northern Territory government in former years has neglected them. You cannot say that we are not looking after them, yet we are spending 47% of our budget. Either we are or we are not.
The minister quoted the former minister, the member for Drysdale, about the diseases in the Northern Territory from 1979-95 that 23% or nearly quarter of all deaths in the Northern Territory were due to kidney diseases, diabetes, high blood pressure, ischaemic heart disease or chronic lung disease. The member for Johnston also quoted those figures about death rates in the Northern Territory versus Australia.
Lifestyle diseases are things that we can do something about ourselves and that is what we have been doing over the last 10 to 15 years. The health professionals have worked very hard to convince their patients that they have to make lifestyle choices. Lung cancer is directly proportional to the number of cigarettes you smoke, everybody knows that. Diabetes, particularly Type 2 diabetes, is directly proportional to the weight that you gain from the food that you eat, or the level of exercise that you take. Respiratory disease is no different from lung cancer, it is the same sort of thing. That again is due to lifestyle diseases.
You have to recognise also that the Northern Territory government, under the CLP, started vaccinations of all newborn children.
Mr Kiely: It is a Commonwealth program.
Dr LIM: It does not matter what program it is, it is something that the Northern Territory government adopted and provided to Territorians. It is important to do that, and so, Territorians benefit through Northern Territory government programs.
As regards injury, well, let’s go back a little bit in history. Back in 1900, the average life span of an Australian was 43 years. Why did they die so early? From hard work, working out in the bush, trauma. You got a broken leg and you died of septicaemia. You got broken ribs and you died of pneumonia. Those were a natural progression of the injuries that people received back in 1900. By 1950, people were living until they were 63 years of age through the discovery of sulphur drugs, penicillin, better lifestyle, better food and better quality of life. At the turn of this century, the Year 2000, the average life span had increased to somewhere near 83 years of age. In 100 years, the average life span of an Australian had almost doubled.
Almost doubled. Why? Because of lifestyle choices, of improved health care, of improved medical science. And Aboriginal people had the opportunity - unfortunately, I believe - when some social events occurred, such as the 1966 or 1967 referendum, that allowed them open slather access to alcohol without any socialisation of their lifestyle with alcohol.
Mr Bonson interjecting.
Dr LIM: You laugh. The member for Millner laughs and I suggest to him that he looks back into history and look at it.
There are races that have socialised with alcohol for millenia, and others have not. It is no different than the abuse of kava where, in some societies, the socialising of that drug, or drink, occurred with your lifestyle. This is what is happening with the kava abuse in the Northern Territory. It is unfortunate, I believe, that members opposite tend to be a little bit deaf about that. They want to talk about politically correct issues - open your minds and look at it in an objective light.
The minister spoke very superficially about her focus on drugs. I was a little bit surprised, after having read through their policy document, that she has so little to talk about her drug policy. She talks about her three point plan but fails to elaborate, to show us what she intends to do. She speaks nothing about what she plans to do with rehabilitation, what she plans to do about social drug abuse. She does not talk to us about what she plans to do with the methadone program, which I believe is in her party’s policy, and she needs to be honest with Territorians and spell out exactly what she plans to do. There is no mention in her statement about Buprenorphine, which is one of the new drugs that has recently been recommended nationally for use in drug addiction. I hope the minister in her response closing debate will deal with some of those issues.
As regards the use of morphine that the member for Johnston spoke about, the way he came across, one would have thought that every doctor in the Northern Territory has been prescribing morphine willy nilly without due care for the patient’s wellbeing, and …
Dr Burns: That is not what I said.
Dr LIM: I think that is the way that the member for Johnston came across. If I am wrong then I believe that he needs to then rephrase his words. Most doctors in the Northern Territory are very ethical and professional people, and would use all forms of drugs to the best benefit of their patients, and slagging doctors is, in my opinion, unnecessary and in error. There were indeed some doctors who were abusing their privilege and their legal authority to prescribe Schedule 8 drugs, and those doctors have been identified and, indeed, some have been punished. I believe that is a proper way of ensuring that the medial profession adheres to their privilege of writing prescriptions for Schedule 8 drugs. If you do that you will have a fairly good control of legally prescribed Schedule 8 drugs out on the streets.
It is not an easy task, many a time, for a doctor to identify whether a person is in real pain or is looking for narcotics to use in their drug addiction. When a person is going through narcotic drug withdrawal, that person is actually feeling pain, pain that is identical to any other organic pain you can name. It is not an easy task for the doctor to identify what is causing the pain. Ask any doctor you like, I suggest to the health minister, and she will find out for sure for herself whether I am right or not.
I am happy with the minister’s statement in that she supports what Territory Health Services has been doing over many years. I am happy that she recognises the quality of our professional staff, and I look forward to her working closely with the staff, because I believe they will give her good advice. However, I would like to see more detail from her about her drug program that she is talking about. I would like to see more detail as to how she will address the lifestyle diseases that our indigenous population suffer from, and how she proposes to turn the rate of illnesses around, especially among the indigenous people. I look forward to seeing her improve renal care services. I congratulate the minister and her government on making a promise that they will introduce renal services into Tennant Creek.
Mr HENDERSON (Industries and Business): Madam Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to speak in this debate tonight in terms of it being the first statement on health from the new health minister in the Labor government. I wish the minister well in what is a very challenging portfolio area and one which I covered for two years in opposition. Certainly, we on this side of the House, this government acknowledges, as well as the previous government, that it is a very challenging portfolio area. One of the few things I will agree with the former health minister , the member for Drysdale on, in his contribution to the debate, is that, yes, you will always have people coming to you saying if we spend more money in this area we will get better outcomes. The great challenge for health is trying to get improved outcomes within acceptable budget frameworks.
My contribution to this debate is to look at the record of the previous government in terms of health outcomes. At the end of the day, that is what we should be judged on in terms of implementation of public policy across all areas, and outcomes is one of them.
My colleague, the member for Johnston, was very eloquent in terms of his exposure - and I did speak in the previous parliament about the Mortality in the Northern Territory 1979-1997 document. That is a significant period of time to track health outcomes in the Northern Territory, certainly within all the boundaries of statistics. Those outcomes are not based on aberrations; they are very real over time. That is where the rhetoric of the previous government in terms of the great improvements in the health system in the Northern Territory, falls down. I would urge all members of this House to actually get a copy of that document, to go through the tables disease category by disease category, and look at the tables and understand what is happening here in terms of the health profile of Territorians, both indigenous and non-indigenous. Take the politics out of it and have an objective analysis of that document - and I would urge all honourable members to do that - and be informed about what is happening in regard to public health in the Northern Territory.
There is no doubt over that period, from 1979 to 1997, in comparison with all other Australian jurisdictions, we have gone backwards. That is the bottom line: we have gone backwards. We have gone backwards in terms of indigenous health and non-indigenous health. Now they are the outcomes. Yes, we have good health facilities. The majority of the funding for those facilities in our urban centres has come from the Commonwealth through - certainly in recent times - Medicare funding. But the outcomes in terms of public health in the Northern Territory, have gone backwards over that period 1979 to 1997.
In previous debates in this parliament, I challenged the former health minister as to why that document was never published. Why there was never a public launch of the document in the same manner that its predecessor, Morbidity and Mortality in the Northern Territory 1979-1991, was actually published at that time with a great deal of fanfare. I was having academics, health professionals, come to me asking ‘Where is this document? We know that it has been collated; we know it has been put together, we have all had input into providing the figures and the statistics, but it has never been published’.
Dr Burns: We know why.
Mr HENDERSON: Well, as my colleague interjects, we know why. It is such an abysmal tale, such a poor reflection on public health policy over the period of previous CLP administrations, that it was never released, it was sat on, and it never saw the light of day.
This is the legacy that we have to move forward from as a new government in the Northern Territory, paying due attention to health and public health policies. I suppose one of the worst statistics out of that document - and I am not going to trawl through them again - is that the gap between indigenous and non-indigenous life expectancy has increased from 18.7 years in the period 1981-1985, to 22.2 years in 1996-97. We have the gap in terms of life expectancy between indigenous and non-indigenous Territorians actually getting bigger. That is really an appalling statistic in this day and age.
The previous health minister spoke about the former parliament’s Public Accounts Committee report on Aboriginal health. That was a bipartisan committee of this parliament that did produce a seminal piece of work in regards to that report. We as a government will actually be auditing the recommendations from that Public Accounts Committee report - which I believe reported to this parliament in 1997, if my memory serves me correctly - just to see how much and how many of those recommendations from that bipartisan committee report were actually ever implemented by previous governments.
Starting from a point of outcomes, I would challenge any objective analysis by any members opposite to actually look at that mortality report 1979 to 1997 and say that previous governments in the Northern Territory had good stewardship of public health policy and actually achieved real successes, because the truth lies in the statistics. Certainly, the previous administration has nothing to crow about.
Moving on to other issues that have been raised in the minister’s statement, the vexed issue of renal failure in the Northern Territory. Again, as a shadow minister in this House, I brought renal failure forward as a Matter of Public Importance. Again, we would have to say there are great professionals in the Northern Territory who have been doing fantastic work in terms of studies; in terms of understanding the causes of renal failure in the Northern Territory; and putting in place programs to pick up the indicators early so that we can improve, with communities, the lifestyle issues that will prevent end-stage renal failure occurring and the expensive treatment of dialysis. Look at Wendy Hoy and the work that she did in the Tiwi Islands. Much work was done - the screening programs were put in place, strategies were put in place - that showed marked improvement in terms of the prevalence of end-stage renal failure in the Tiwi Islands.
Again, we had a strategy that was worked up, that was developed, and then the previous administrations failed to systemically implement that strategy across the Northern Territory, despite its proven successes. We debated this previously in the House and the former health minister would say: ‘Well, look, as a government we are not into templating solutions across the Northern Territory’. Well, I can say that this government is certainly going to be looking at strategies that work, strategies that have been proven to work, and looking at systemic implementation of those strategies over time. Because at the end of the day, there are enormous dollars to be saved, let alone qualities of life improved, by improving health at the base level in communities. Certainly, for screening programs for infant children in communities to pick up problems in the early childhood stages, we have committed to 25 child health nurses. This is where we can make an impact and where previous administrations failed in terms of doing the preventative work at the beginning.
The previous health minister has acknowledged - and I do not have the media report in front of me here, it was on the public record - that people do go off into the bush to die in the Northern Territory. It is a choice that they make in terms of having to relocate from rural communities to go to either Alice Springs or Darwin for treatment. This is not an option for many Territorians in terms of leaving their family, leaving their country at a time of their life when they are very sick. The previous minister, the member for Drysdale, has acknowledged on the public record that people do go off into the bush to die. Well, yes that is their choice. That is the choice that they make, but what an appalling choice that those people have been forced to make. To blindly say, ‘That is the way it is. We are not going to be looking at putting these services into regional communities’, and the blind acceptance that if people want to choose to wander off into the bush and die – well, it certainly would not be accepted in an urban setting. This government is not going to accept that philosophy. We will put those renal services into Tennant Creek and progressively strive to put them into other regional centres as well. The choice of life or death to access fairly common medical treatment is not a choice that should be forced onto Territorians, regardless of their background.
Moving to the Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy, again my colleague, the member for Johnston, who was involved in his previous life in terms of various committees - and again, we have debated it in this House. I think the first statement that I responded to as a shadow health minister was the original tabling statement of the Preventable Chronic Diseases Strategy. We all agree - it is the one thing that everybody agrees on - it is a fantastic strategy and a lot of hard work went into it. Our criticism was that it was never systemically implemented; it was never appropriately funded. It was a document that could be held up and championed as being a seminal piece of work that saw the light of day to great accolades around the country, in terms of medical conferences, but we have wasted two years in the Northern Territory in terms of implementing that strategy. It is something that this government is going to be moving very quickly to do.
Again, everything costs money and it is all a matter of priorities but, to use an old analogy, prevention is better than a cure and it is certainly the only piece of work that we have that has total commitment from the medical academic community through to the practicing community through to indigenous organisations. We have to look at how we dovetail that strategy into the new health zones in terms of giving people the responsibility for making decisions regarding health in those communities. But it is certainly one that we are going to be moving ahead on and it is certainly one that the previous government could never demonstrate any real commitment to the implementation of that strategy.
Moving onto the issue of drugs. We have debated illicit drugs and the previous government’s attitude to the public policy that they adopted in terms of illicit drugs, in terms of the health strategy and the law and order strategy at the time. We had numerous debates in this House. I just want to put on the public record and quote from the previous Chief Minister, now Leader of the Opposition, in response to a question from the current Chief Minister on 9 August 2000. Reading from the Hansard, the question was in regard to drug-related crime, and I will quote from the Hansard for the Leader of the Opposition:
- There is drug-related crime in the Northern Territory. There is no doubt about that. But compared to other
jurisdictions, it is minuscule.
So there is the Hansard quote. Compared to other jurisdictions, drug-related crime in the Northern Territory is miniscule. He was quoting the previous Chief Minister, the now Leader of the Opposition, with that head-in-the-sand approach and attitude to what was happening in the Northern Territory, and in Darwin and Palmerston in particular, about drug-related crime.
If there is one issue in terms of health policy that I am passionate about, it is to be moving very quickly on this issue to get some public policy, decent public policy together in the Northern Territory to actually start winding back on the appalling legacy that we have inherited in regards to public drug policy in the Northern Territory which is the laughing stock of the rest of Australia.
Mr Dunham: And they have it worked out. They’ve got it by the throat down there in Cabramatta.
Mr HENDERSON: No. Madam Speaker, if we just look at some facts in terms of what is happening in the Northern Territory, what happened under the previous administration and the explosion in drug use and drug-related crime that occurred particularly over the last five to 10 years, and members opposite who practiced law and the legal profession and who had to stand in criminal trials and hear mitigating circumstances over and over and over and over again in regards to the part that drugs played and the use that drugs played in terms of crime in the Northern Territory, those facts will come to light.
Let’s look at a couple of figures. They have been quoted in this House before, but for new members who may not be aware, in the last year the Northern Territory AIDS Council in Darwin - and the previous health minister talked about have we visited the AIDS Council and Banyan House and Howard’s tough-on-drugs strategies - 460 000 needles were distributed into the Darwin and Palmerston population. 460 000 needles. Over the last three years, I think the rate of distribution of these needles has seen about a 30% increase per year - this is the minuscule problem that we have in the Northern Territory - predominantly being used for morphine and amphetamines – an explosion in the use of amphetamines as well. We had morphine prescription rates at nine times the national average, which were never acknowledged by the previous government until it was raised with alarm by the Health Insurance Commission because essentially a fraud was being perpetrated on the PBS system in terms of the amount of morphine that was being prescribed.
Mr DUNHAM: A point of order, Madam Speaker. The member is alleging there was a fraud on the PBS system. The previous speaker talked about doctors acting illicitly. I think it is only fair to those people outside the House that this be demonstrated.
Madam SPEAKER: Did you use the term ‘fraud’?
Mr HENDERSON: Madam Speaker, the words I used were that there was a fraud being perpetrated on the PBS system. I was not accusing a member opposite of fraud.
Madam SPEAKER: There is no point of order. In that context, it is okay.
Mr HENDERSON: Madam Speaker, as a point of clarification, the member for Johnston, and the Parliamentary Record will prove him out, did not state that doctors were involved in illicit prescribing practices. What we had at the time, and probably still have today in terms of what is happening out there, is a prescription rate of morphine that is in excess of the average ratios of the other states. That is as a direct result of the public policy that the previous administration had in regards to failing to approve and allow methadone for drug maintenance and detox, for failing to approve and allow new drugs such as buprenorphine and naltrexone. Despite talking about these things and saying ‘We are looking at them,’ there was no alternative regime for clinical practitioners in the Northern Territory to actually refer people on to for appropriate treatment.
A direct consequence of the public policy was this explosion in morphine and the numbers that my colleague, the member for Johnston, put before this House in terms of the diversion of that morphine into the black market to a $10m a year criminal trade – and you can do the numbers yourself based on the average price on the street for a tablet of morphine at $50 a throw – and we can see what an enormous consequence and an impact that this drug use in the Territory, illicit drug use, was having on crime. Because the people who are addicted, the people who have an addiction, have to feed that addiction. They are obviously not working. Where do they get the money from? You do not need to be a rocket scientist to work out that they are breaking into peoples houses, breaking into peoples businesses - the Northern Territory News has been full of examples - to steal other people’s property to sell to feed their drug habit because the previous Northern Territory government did not have in place public policy that recognised the extent of the problem and provided for treatment services.
If we look at Banyan House, the only opiate treatment facility in the Northern Territory, as I have said in this House before and we will be working with Banyan House, it was an election commitment to upgrade that, is you wouldn’t kennel your dog out there. I have been to Banyan House. They are great people out there who are doing a fantastic job in appalling circumstances. The previous government had promised them verbally on a number of occasions that they would get an injection of funds to upgrade that facility, but of course because it was never a priority, it never happened. One of the huge advances that we can make as a government, and we will make, is not to bury our head in the sand, to acknowledge the appalling statistics and the appalling tide of frailty in our community in terms of what is happening with illicit drug use, the consequences for families, for community in general, the impact on crime statistics and we will be moving to redress that situation. I am not arguing that we are going to eliminate illicit drug use. We are never going to be able to do that, but we have to be able to do a hell of a lot better than what we are doing at the moment.
Moving on to hospital funding, another key area. The member for Drysdale is always quick to interject, ‘Well, they got the money. Didn’t they get the money?’ The point that we were making and the health minister was making in the statement is that our hospitals, our public hospitals, in terms of the operation of funding to run our public hospital system in the Northern Territory over many years, has been underfunded. The only reason - and the figures in the minister’s statement bear out the fact - that the Royal Darwin Hospital actual expenditure averaged over the period 1995-96 to 1999-2000 - so not just in the year that we had to respond to the Timor crisis - the average over those five years was 7.7% more than was budgeted for. For the other hospitals across the Northern Territory, where the Timor crisis did not impact, the result over that period was 6.4% more.
The pressures of that underfunding on our public hospital system in terms of the management regimes in the hospital, the decisions that have to be made on a daily basis in terms of equipment purchases, staffing ratios, the capacity to recruit and retain specialists, managers are all given at the beginning of the financial year a budget to manage to and quite appropriately, there is significant pressure on those managers to deliver in terms of bringing in expenditure on or under budget. The problem with the previous administration’s funding scenarios was the growth that was totally predicted year on year was never …
Madam SPEAKER: Order, the honourable member’s time has expired.
Mr ELFERINK (Macdonnell): Madam Speaker, I rise just to raise a couple of comments and questions for the minister for health. I can say that I was heartily mortified when I heard from the member for Johnston that some $10m worth of illicit morphine was allowed into the community. Indeed, it was supported by the honourable minister who has just sat down. I confess that I am deeply concerned by this because as I understand it, there was an inquiry into this process of prescribing drugs for the market place and two doctors were struck off or had their licences revoked to prescribe medicine. I would like to know from the minister first, whether or not she agrees with the figure that was placed on morphine in the community that the member for Johnston told us, and second, if you do agree with that figure, I am deeply concerned that only two doctors have been struck off, unless those two doctors are responsible between themselves for prescribing some $10m worth of morphine into the community. It sounds like you have a major problem, minister. Second, my question is that, if the honourable member for Johnston was aware of this horrible trade, did he report it to police? I am wondering if the minister can advise whether or not the member for Johnston actually had approached her at any stage in relation to this matter.
Madam Speaker, I am not going to enter into the Ministerial Statement per se, but I am intrigued by this document that the member for Johnston had tabled in this Chamber at the request of the member for Drysdale in accordance with standing orders. I was horrified to hear the allegation that the Northern Territory government had sat on a report simply because it did not suit the Northern Territory government’s outcomes. So, I have taken the opportunity to get that copy and, to my surprise, on the inside cover is a notation. It is the first page in, Roman numerals II: ‘This work is subject to copyright. It may be reproduced in whole or in part or for study or training purposes’ – yada, yada, yada as the usual copyright disclaimer suggests.
The second item down the page is a suggested citation for the purposes of future reference by other people who read the document. The next area down is the copyright, ‘Copyright 1999 by Territory Health Services. Printed by the Government Printer of the Northern Territory’, and then it provides an ISBN, 0724533648. It was printed in November 1999. This highly secretive, suppressed document was published and Madam Speaker, just as I am on my feet, the Attendant has entered this Chamber with the secret document, the secret, suppressed document that was secretly suppressed in our library for reference of anybody who wanted to pick up and read it. It is an absolute …
Dr Burns: Never publicly released.
Mr ELFERINK: It is on the library bookshelf, you dill. It is sitting on the library bookshelf. This is a copy I just got from the library. Any member of the public can look into that library. Madam Speaker, it is incumbent upon members in this Chamber when they come into this Chamber to tell the truth, not to mislead this Chamber. There is no suppression of any documents here. This was a published document; it was not secreted away. What does the member for Johnston recommend? What does the member for Johnston recommend, a glossy? The glossy that his colleagues are so critical of. Perhaps we should have trumpeters every time that the Northern Territory government publishes something.
This is an absolutely outrageous attempt to try to build a cloak and dagger environment around the former government for his own furtive purposes. And if he wants to maintain so much as a shred of integrity in this place, then he should come in here and tell the people of the Northern Territory the truth.
Ms CARTER (Port Darwin): Madam Speaker, I feel I must respond to the minister’s paper. However, I certainly was disappointed to realise halfway into her delivery that we had received a draft rather than the final paper, so I must say that the comments that I am about to make now generally have been made and prepared relative to the first paper. So we are going to draw on the first paper.
Just to put it in perspective where I am coming from, I would like to share with members my background in the health system. It has been a long and varied background over the last 20 years since self-government. In 1979, I came to Darwin as a Registered Nurse and worked at the Royal Darwin Hospital. In 1980, I moved to the then called Casuarina Hospital now Royal Darwin Hospital and worked for some time in the Accident and Emergency department and then for some years in the orthopaedic department. In the mid-1980s I studied at the Northern Territory University and then worked at the Darwin Private Hospital part time. In 1989, I moved to Katherine and was the Nurse Educator for the Katherine district. That included the remote area nurses as well as the hospital and community nurses. In 1993, I moved back to Darwin to work in the Women’s Health Unit particularly in the area of cancer prevention. I then went to Batchelor College as a senior lecturer working with the Aboriginal health workers, then moved back to Darwin to work in health promotion particularly in the quit smoking area. I then moved to the Work Health Authority for several years, running the education program there and finally, prior to assuming this position, I was working for several years as an investigator in the Health and Community Services Complaints Commission.
Thank you for your tolerance in letting me list that resume. The reason I do so is to demonstrate the variety of roles I have held within the health system, both public and private, over the last 20 years which of course gives me a certain perspective when commenting on the minister’s statement. I will also say that I tend to be a very honest person. I am fairly direct in the comments that I make and I am not particularly politically correct. That may or not be a fault but I am not one of them.
So, here we go. I accept that this is the first ministerial statement from the minister and from my point of view it is a fairly weak effort that has been wasted. It has been wasted on an attempt at political point scoring which, to my point of view, has been fairly pointless. We have many health problems here in the Northern Territory, just as most if not all jurisdictions do, and I think to a degree this has been a waste of time. In the last week and a bit that we have been here since we have come back into the Chamber swapping sides, we have seen that the government is spending a great deal of time going on and on and on about the previous government’s work. Quite frankly, the problems we face as a community need us to look to the future. I accept that we will cop a bit of a blasting but today’s effort from the minister was disappointing in that over 50% if not more of her statement was really concentrating on the previous government’s work rather than looking towards the future and what her government is going to do.
With regard to health problems though, being someone who has been looking at them for several decades now, I look with interest at the problems in other jurisdictions in Australia and overseas, looking to see how they are solving their problems. For all of us, we are all here with one goal in mind and that is to better the health of the people in our community and to better our communities. It is certainly disappointing across the world to see how difficult it is to have really solid inroads into health improvement, and it is a frustrating area and it is one which we all face.
What the new government should be doing is being very careful in the kind of promises that they are making. You have made some extraordinary claims today as to how you are going to, or what you are going to, achieve in your health program. In a couple of years’ time you are going to see Territorians across the board looking at these claims and thinking, ‘Gosh! Nothing really changed’. You need to temper some of your plans or your goals, the things that you think that you are going to achieve, because regardless of which jurisdiction you look at in Australia - and many of them of course now are headed by Labor governments and I can talk specifically about New South Wales and Queensland, neither of these jurisdictions have a faultless health program. I would argue that if you went to, for example, an Aboriginal community in the Territory and then to one over the border in Queensland, you would see very little difference and yet it has had a Labor government for quite a few years. So, be very careful with the promises that you are making.
I wonder whether this statement today - and I wonder how many people had a finger in the pie, so to speak; I wonder who wrote it. It certainly struck me that whoever had the major input into it has a pathological hatred of the CLP. It came through really loud and strong there and I do not think that that was overly constructive. So, rather than having a passion for health which many of us share, and I suspect your new minister does, too, this real hatred of the previous government came through loud and clear. It was over the top and disappointing.
So let’s go to Aboriginal health. This is a very difficult area, regardless of your jurisdiction, regardless almost of your country. If you go to the United States, if you go to Canada, both of those communities also have major problems with the health of their indigenous people. Certainly, if you look at the health of the first Americans, their health and some of their problems are very similar to our Aboriginal people. So blaming this previous government, to my mind, serves no purpose. It wastes time and effort. It is very easy to do, to blame a distant person or a distant entity for your troubles, and many people in our community do that. Rank and file members of our community, when the going gets tough, see who they can blame rather than look in upon themselves and ask what they can change about themselves in order to get somewhere.
I am certainly a feminist, and with the feminist movement kicking off in the 1960s, one of the things that the feminists did was look very much at themselves as women, and at various other groups, and to say, ‘Listen, governments per se are not really helping us. We as women need to grab the agenda and to do the work ourselves’. I do applaud any measure to empower Aboriginal people to do the same thing, because you will really get nowhere unless it is the actual people who are making the changes and making the differences. But often those changes are difficult, as the member for Greatorex pointed out. Lifestyle diseases are often a result of personal behaviour, and those things need to be changed at a personal level. Not easy to do, and for those of you who smoke, as I know some do, certainly some on our side of the House here, they would know in particular how difficult it is to change your behaviour.
Let’s look instead at a very good document that came out last year - and I know I am going to get howls of abuse when I mention it, but it is certainly something I feel has a lot of value, and that is the Collins Report. What I particularly admired in that document was the way that he brought into the discussions the need for the people in Aboriginal communities to be involved in the process, and to take some responsibility for how things are going to operate. For my mind, the Collins Report can be tied into health, and that health activities and health programs need to look at what has been suggested there at a health level, to be looking for community involvement and people who live in communities to say: ‘We need to change some things here’.
I remember when I was the Nurse Educator in the Katherine area, there was an excellent video produced that we used as part of our orientation program, a two day program I used to run, for new nurses to the area. The first day of the program was very heavily involved with Aboriginal cultural issues, to explain to nurses, particularly those from overseas, about where they are in the Katherine district, often people who are working with the Aboriginal culture and living the Aboriginal culture coming to hospital, and to have a better understanding of how to help these people. The video that I am talking about, I cannot remember the name of it, but the gist of it was it was set in Canada with Canadian Indians, and it dealt with alcohol problems in their community. The whole message of this video was how important it was for people in a community to take control of the situation and to make the hard decisions themselves for the betterment of their community. There are communities in Canada and in the United States that have done very well with this sort of a program that has been run by the people themselves.
You mentioned in your statement, chronic diseases, for example heart and lung disease. I said earlier that these are very often caused by lifestyle choices such as smoking and diet. People really do have to take some responsibility for their behaviour. However, I certainly feel that many remote area community stores - and there has been a fair bit of research on this - charge a very high rate for some of the standard healthy foods, and certainly there needs to be more done in the area of trying to assist remote area communities to access good food, healthy food, at a reasonable price.
Also, of course, is the need for education on lifestyle issues, and certainly we can do more in that area as well. But in the end - and I can speak from my experience in the quit smoking program - in the end, it is down to the individual to make those choices. Here in Darwin, for example, and members of the parliament, welcome to the new parliamentary family - I know when I came in as a member of parliament here, one of the choices that I had to make very early on was the need to be careful with my diet. There might be guffaws from the House on that one, but the reality is that as parliamentarians we are invited to numerous functions, be they here in Parliament House or out in the community, and the end result for some of us is putting on weight. Really, it is only down to one person as to whether or not you can control that, and that is yourself. It is not always easy to do, to control the intake at these functions that we go to.
So it is not easy, as I say, to control behaviour when you are being tempted, be it by fatty foods, either here in Darwin or out in remote communities, or being tempted by cigarettes or things of that nature. In the end …
Ms Carney: Alcohol as well.
Ms CARTER: As the member for Araluen says, alcohol as well. So all of these temptations come before us and, looking around the House at the moment, I can say most of us are making very healthy choices, and I congratulate you on that. We do have to make those choices, and they are not easy to make, regardless of who you are or where you are. There is a significant element in health that is based on the behaviour of the individual.
I look forward to an increase in Aboriginal involvement in health care decisions, and I do hope that it improves the outcomes there. Many contacts that I have out bush, and I still have them, believe that out there at the moment, since the Labor government was elected, the expectations in remote area health clinics is extremely high that things are really going to change. Once again, I wonder at the level of disappointment that might occur in a couple of year’s time. I do again counsel you to be careful of the sort of promises that you are making, because people are listening and their expectations are going to be very high, and I am concerned about the level of disappointment they might have if they do not come to fruition.
On page 3 of the first version of the ministerial statement that was put out, the minister quotes some statistics and, to my mind, they are very creative. There has really been no attempt made to compare apples with apples. They do not really add up at all. The Northern Territory situation is very different from the southern situation. For example, with non-indigenous people, we have a low hospitalisation rate because we are substantially younger than our southern counterparts. These statistical interpretations have been used to cloud certain issues; we are a younger population in the non-Aboriginal groupings.
When I talk about expectations - I mentioned earlier Queensland, Western Australia, and New South Wales, all areas that have large Aboriginal communities living in remote areas. You cannot look across Australia and see vast differences in Aboriginal health outcomes. As I say, I wish you well in the programs that you are going to put into place but I do have some doubt as to how beneficial they will be in the long run given that your vitriolic attack on the former government implying that our gross mismanagement is the only reason that Aboriginal health is in the poor state that it is in today. Other jurisdictions also have problems there.
You are going to - and I am pleased to see - combat, sounds like a very total word, illicit drug use. To my mind, this is another piece of rhetoric. It reminds me of a fellow who once promised that there would be no child living in Australia in poverty, more rhetoric. Up go the expectations again. With regard to illicit drug use, you have had a Labor government in power in New South Wales for many, many years and, although I am not conversant with all of the drug statistics, my suspicion is that they would have the biggest drug problem in this country. Labor has not helped them.
As a person who is qualified in the area of health promotion, I am interested to see that you are going to, with regard to drugs, force people into rehabilitation - what you describe as ‘compulsory treatment’. It is absolutely pointless to force people into treatment or into rehabilitation. Behaviour only changes when a person really wants to change it and to my mind, compulsory rehabilitation treatment is going to be absolutely useless. Good luck with that one.
Methadone of course is a very popular topic and I look forward to being involved in the subcommittee or in a committee being organised at the moment looking at drug issues here in the Territory. I will be interested to contribute to the debate on methadone. It is a topic that interests me and in that interest, I have done a number of library searchers on the topic of methadone and got some very interesting stuff in the process. I am unable to quote directly from a particular article at the moment because it is down at my electorate office, but there is a paper available that has an interview with a person who is currently a drug addict. He talks about how methadone is essentially a gift to addicts when they cannot be bothered using heroin or whatever it might be. They will use methadone for a short period of time, but when it suits them to go back into the social event of drug use, or whatever it might be, then they will go back into the use of illicit and illegal drugs. So, to his point of view, methadone is an absolute cop out, and I believe that was the term that he used, a cop out, because it really does not solve anything. It is just a replacement drug.
It does not help them move one way or the other. It is a replacement drug. As the member for Port Darwin, I am particularly interested to know where you are going to place the methadone clinic, because I suspect it is going to come into my electorate. I am very concerned, naturally, that that means we are going to see an increase in people living in this electorate who use illicit drugs. One week they will be using the methadone program, and the next week, well, they might go and knock over a few houses and do something else. They might do this, they might do that, and they will leave their needles lying around. So needless to say, wherever you are going to put your methadone clinics, we will all be very interested to see that, and be interested to see how our community members respond to that.
I agree with the member for Drysdale; I will be interested to see your commitment to the DARE program which has been a positive thing that the Territory police have been doing for many years, and we would like to see an ongoing commitment to that.
Mr Deputy Speaker, I will conclude by saying that I consider the statement to be disappointing, negative, certainly very idealistic and to my mind it lacks a certain degree of pragmatism. As government members, you are going to be working to the constraints of a budget and in years to come, you are going to find it a difficult thing to do. I wish you all the best with it. The CLP looks to the future; the ALP looks to the past. The ALP has given this community huge expectations. I realise that you consider it very enjoyable to blame the CLP for everything that is going on at the moment, but you had better get over it quickly. You do not have time to waste and you will find this a difficult experience.
Dr TOYNE (Attorney-General): Mr Deputy Speaker, I would like to confine my comments to the areas of health delivery in the remote areas. In doing this, I want to canvass some of the issues where the Labor party’s policy impacts on the delivery of health services in electorates such as Stuart and Macdonnell. I would like to talk a little bit more about dialysis in remote communities which some of the long standing members would know has been a interest of mine.
The Labor party policy on service delivery generally is that wherever possible, we want to mediate that delivery for indigenous people and remote communities through appropriate groups that are drawn together or express interest in that area of government service delivery. So we are really moving in the direction of the cashed up arrangements such as were put into the Tiwi Islands and the Katherine West Health Board. The purpose of going in that direction is to build indigenous priorities and indigenous perceptions and more widely than indigenous people, the many people who are involved in government service delivery in remote communities of a non-indigenous background. It is very easy to forget that we have dedicated teachers, we have dedicated nurses, doctors and administrators out in the communities. You often hear about the dysfunctional things that come out and the horror stories of things that have gone wrong, but what you do not generally hear about is people who are there, day after day, week after week, year after year, doing really solid work and trying to hold together what is increasingly difficult situation.
Many of the factors that they are wrestling with have a much broader nature than you can hope to control in an individual community - the drift into town of adults, the high turnover of staff generally in these institutions such as remote schools and clinics - all make it a real challenge to follow your profession, follow your committed area of work in that context. It is equally difficult for indigenous people who have gone through the training to become health workers, become teachers and to shape their practice, not only against the expectations of the various departments that deliver the services out there, but also to harmonise them with their family obligations and their cultural obligations. It is not easy, and it is not easy for the non-indigenous people out there to work in partnership with people within the organisation.
First of all, I would like to pay tribute to the enormous positive outcomes that have been achieved by our best and fairest out there in the bush, and will continue to be achieved - against all odds at times. I would also like to underwrite that the statistics that we heard earlier on from the member for Johnston regarding the continued deterioration in indigenous health are very real. They are very much part of many factors and in fact to make inroads into those health profiles is going to take an enormous and concerted effort.
What our policy says is that we have tried it the old way; we have tried it for fifty years, long before self-government when the Commonwealth was running services in this part of Australia. We have tried to centralise decision making; put the package out of the generic packages, of saying this is how a health service should look, or a school, or an education program. It hasn’t got us anywhere. We have not managed to attach our schooling to employment. We have not managed to attach health to education. We have not managed to attach the lifestyle of our remote communities to the type of government support, the types of aims that the government programs are attempting in that context.
So, it is time for a major rethink about how services are delivered to our remote communities. I think the starting point has to be the local people, whether they are non-indigenous or indigenous, working through a secure decision making process. Now, government cannot withdraw from that. Obviously, we have to have some moderation of what goes on in a school or a clinic, or in any institute out there, to guarantee that there is a core of skills coming out of the school, or a core of coverage within a health service that is defendable against what happens to the average Australian all over Australia. That core can certainly be kept in place without curtailing the ability of local people to come up with innovative solutions to the business of effective service delivery.
I would expect under these policies as we move through systematically to look each region and what each community wants to do with its service delivery at the NT level, or perhaps at both the NT and the Commonwealth level, that there will be a whole lot of different structures that will come into play. I am sure some groups will want to specialise in one area of service delivery, and other ones might want to do a combination. Some groups might want to set up a one-stop-shop for all types of service delivery. Whatever that is, as long as there is commitment to it in the local area, commitment to the extent that a really strong plan can be drawn together, then there is no reason under our policies why the government cannot cash up that service delivery, go into a service delivery agreement and support the local service delivery in that regard.
Speaking about the chronic disease area, I mentioned earlier that I have had a longstanding interest in how to support the communities regarding the problem of chronic disease. It has quite rightly been identified as being the number one growth area in our health budget for all the wrong reasons. All the antecedents of chronic disease are still out there - substance abuse, the general lifestyle of communities, diet, genetics - of all those probably play a part in the incidence of chronic disease in the Northern Territory, in particular in our remote communities. We need to take urgent action on all fronts, everything from the clinical support of people who have gone into end stage renal failure and advanced stages of diabetes, the former contributed to by the latter. At the same time, we have to look at the antecedents of those diseases and work with the communities in preventative health programs to try to cut the supply of new patients going into these areas of ill health.
My work with the Western Desert Dialysis Appeal over the last couple of years has certainly shown that there are many people around Australia who are interested to help outside the resources of government. I cannot see one earthly reason why, now being in government, that work should cease. The original Western Desert Dialysis Appeal, which was based on Kintore, Kiwirrkurra and Mt Liebig, and Papunya, around that area of the Western Desert, raised $1m and it raised it from the art market from people who were concerned by the plight of end stage renal failure patients, that they were prepared to chuck in big time to the point that a $1m was raised in one day. That money is now being put back through to the Western Desert Appeal implementation process. The WDDA is now run with a project officer, Dr Paul Rivalland, who now answers to a Pintupi Board which consists of seven people drawn from Kiwirrkurra and Kintore. They are his bosses. At the other side of him stands the Friends of the Western Desert Dialysis Appeal which is some 120 people consisting of health professionals, art market dealers, bureaucrats, people from all walks of life who are prepared to not only provide further funding if necessary, but also their own expertise as needed as the project develops.
The money is held under a very strong bookkeeping system and the project is being supported out of the School of Remote Health in Alice Springs. I am very grateful to Dr John Wakerman for offering the sponsorship of his organisation to maintain the development of the Western Desert Dialysis activities. Patients are already having home returns. Every two months, each patient who is currently based in Alice Springs can go back home by charter flight or by bus out of Tangentyere Council to visit their families and sit down for a day or so back home. That has been hugely appreciated and has made a big impact on their morale - and that is by the judgment of the social worker who is working with the patients. We expect that the next stage will be a visit to the Royal Perth Hospital to have a look at the model that is used in the Western Australian remote communities of self-dialysis for most patients, the patients that are certainly physically capable of doing that. Patients are taken to the Royal Perth Hospital for a period of anything up to a year, but usually more like six months, and they are trained in the use of the equipment and then return to their communities under the care of a general nurse with regular contacts with specialists.
So, we have got away from the very expensive model of having specially trained renal nurses and nephrologists having to be available to a dialysis program on a continual basis. The interesting thing is that the patients in the Western Australian program are actually outlasting the average survival rates of patients in places like the Alice Springs dialysis program. So there does not seem any intrinsic reason why patients cannot carry out a lot of their own care under the overall supervision of a general nurse and with specialist input from time to time to make sure things are going okay.
I will finish my contribution to this debate by indicating that the people who drew together the Western Desert Dialysis Appeal are now wanting to move on to yet another appeal aimed at getting recreation facilities into some of the remote communities, particularly swimming pools. They now have teamed up - they are a very versatile mob - the art dealers are wanting to go back to the art market again, and they are claiming that the $1m is the tip of the iceberg and it was just the Sydney art patrons who contributed to that original appeal. They want to now move on to Melbourne as well as Sydney, and they are also have a commitment from the AFL to include in it events that involve Aboriginal footballers from the AFL contributing to fundraising events there. They have set themselves a target of $5m, Mr Deputy Speaker, and if we get $5m from that appeal, that is going to make a huge impact on the Western Desert communities if we can build decent facilities for those communities using these publicly raised funds.
This stuff is inspiring and when you look at the combination of the people who are out there working in our health delivery areas, the fact that this new government has a fresh approach to the way in which service delivery can be offered to those communities, and the goodwill and the effort that is available to people who realise how serious things are out there, we don’t need to be all doom and gloom. There are some great things that are going to be achieved in the next few years and we are going to give it a red hot go.
Mr KIELY (Sanderson): Mr Deputy Speaker, I commend the minister on the points that she brought forward. I will confine my comments now to the government’s plan to tackle illicit drugs. I would like to talk about the human face of the drug problem that we have out in our suburbs, out in the northern suburbs, out in my electorate of Sanderson. During the course of this debate, we have talked about drugs addicts. I have had the feeling when we talk about these people we pass them over as some sort of under class, some sort of people who by nefarious means pick up their drugs and they are always involved in crime and running around terrorising the neighbourhood.
I will tell you a story about when I was door knocking. I went to a house in Anula and in this house there was a single parent with a young boy about 10 years old. The house outside was pretty knocked about. I went in and I knocked at the door and they said, ‘Come in, come in,’ without even asking who I was and I went into the kitchen area of that house. Here was the householder in terrible pain with an agonised look on their face and they said, ‘Sit down’. I was very chuffed by the hospitality they were showing me, but I could see that there was something wrong. I might say the house was a bit unkempt, no more so than a lot of other places that I have been into in my travels. Anyway, I said, ‘Well, what’s wrong here?’ She said, ‘I have run out of my morphine. I have chronic back pain. I am addicted to morphine. However, my house is known to contain this drug and I am constantly being burgled by people because I am an easy hit’. And what had happened was that the night before, the other drug users in the community had come into the house, basically walked through the place.
This house had no security on it. She had been to the housing authority to ask for security devices but they said that this person did not meet the criteria. So these people would come in and basically walk all over this individual, take her drugs and then leave. This individual was then forced to go to her medical practitioner; be prescribed another course of MS Contin and then she had an arrangement with the medical practitioner and with the chemist that she would have to travel from Anula down to, I think it was Hibiscus. There is no public transport, she had to catch a cab, her mobility was severely limited by her bad back and she would have to go down and get the drug and bring it home and then the cycle would continue.
What she asked of me, in assistance, was could I please make representations from her to Territory Housing so that she could get security screens on her bedroom and so that she could make her bedroom secure, so that she could lock herself in there when she was under medication. I wrote to Territory Housing on her behalf and I did receive a response from them and I have no problems with that. She had also asked whether perhaps she could have some assistance to clean up her yard - so the house did not look so badly knocked around- from the Correctional Services people who sometimes went around and did this.
I went back to see how she was getting on. Her young child came to the door and said, ‘Mum’s in there’. I went inside the house and I spoke to her through the doorway to the bedroom to tell her that that no, on this occasion we had been unsuccessful in getting her house upgraded to the security standards that she wanted but that she was on the list. She spoke to me in what I perceived to be a drug-induced state and thanked me for all my efforts. I looked down and I saw this young child who was trying to look after their parent and I looked at the house which was still pretty well unkempt and I left. I walked out of there. That was all I could do.
But, when I look at it, when I look at the cost to society, of what it costs if we do not tackle this problem with drugs, it is enormous. This woman is going to be in a very poor state of health. She is going to have lifestyle issues. You can bet on that. She is addicted. Her story to me was that her addiction came about through her back injury and then an operation or two and then she kept taking her MS Contin and kept on it and she created a form of addiction. There are no treatment facilities or none that she could avail herself of, so she was pretty well hooked up on it. She was getting her drug prescribed to her. There is a cost. There are other drug addicts in the society, in her suburb, who were preying on her. Her child was not looking well fed, looked to have a few social difficulties; there is another cost there. That is a cost that society will be bearing in the future. The point that I am getting to is that after years of inattention to this problem, what we have is a compounding social cost going on, a social cost that we need to address now.
You talked about the past. We have got to this stage now because there was not enough money put in by the previous government to address such social issues as this, to address the issues of education, of family support for the child. We are going to be paying that cost because of the neglect of the previous government for many, many years to come.
What this government is all about is having a look at that and getting in there. We do not look at the buckets of money and say this bucket is for health and this bucket is for corrections and this bucket is for police services. We look at the whole-of-government budget. We have a look at that and we can see savings. We can see future savings for the community if we address the issue. If we can get this kid straight and stop him from getting into some sort of problems later on, then we have a saving in Correctional Services. If we can get mum fixed up, then we are going to have a saving for the health system later on. That is what our plans are all about. You talk about additional costs and extra money, let’s fix up the problem of drugs in our community and let’s look at the flow on and the extra money that that will free up for our other services.
That is what Labor is all about. Labor is not about just throwing money just willy nilly at any old issue. It is about looking at the society as a whole, tackling pieces of society. What we have here is we just cannot take away one small building block that the CLP had put into place which has enmeshed the whole society in a downward spiral. We have to build a framework around the mess that we have now and then when we strengthen that up, then we can really start addressing the whole social issue.
Mrs AAGAARD (Health, Family and Children’s Services): Madam Speaker, I thank all of the members for their very valuable contribution and I would first like to reiterate that this government is very committed to delivering on health and community services for all Territorians. I am just going to pick up on some of the things which members had particularly asked about during their replies.
The member for Drysdale suggested to me, and it was a very good suggestion, that I should be visiting various Aboriginal communities. I would like to remind him that I have only been the minister for 59 days, but in that time I have been to Alice Springs twice and I have also visited the Tiwi Islands. Although I was not born in the Northern Territory, I have visited a number of Aboriginal communities at the request of Aboriginal friends. I do have some reasonable knowledge of Aboriginal communities and issues on Aboriginal communities.
The member for Drysdale also suggested that I should be visiting many non-government and government organisations in the Territory. I am happy to advise that during this short period of time as a minister, I have seen approximately 150 community organisations in that time and I believe there is a list of more than 500 people waiting to see me, and they have all been scheduled for the next few months. So in fact, I will be seeing large numbers of people but it is not physically possible to see everybody at once.
The member also asked me a direct question in relation to people living in the river bed in Alice Springs. This remark was made in the Centralian Advocate by William Tilmouth of the Tangentyere Council. I will have to get back to Mr Tilmouth to find out about the voracity of the statement.
I thank the member for Johnston for his support and also for providing a very accurate picture of the state of Territory health. The member for Johnston is very committed to improved health outcomes in Northern Territory and his expertise and interest will be of great value to me as minister for health. I thank him for his contribution.
The member for Greatorex asked in particular about buprenorphine and various things to do with illicit drugs in the Northern Territory. One of the points of talking about illicit drugs was that we are going to be bringing together a Drug Task Force to look at all of the issues relating to illicit drugs in the Northern Territory. I do not want to make any assumptions about what that task group, and the briefing from the department, will actually say, so it may be that buprenorphine is appropriate. It may be that methadone is appropriate. I will wait until I have been advised by the task force, and consulted with the community, before making any kind of statements like that.
I would like to thank the member for Wanguri for his support, particularly as he has been the opposition spokesperson on health. He has very been helpful in my first few weeks as minister, and I thank him very much for that.
The member for Macdonnell asked particularly about the $10m which the member for Johnston raised in relation to the use of morphine in the Northern Territory. I have been advised that this is actually correct, and I would be happy to provide a detailed response to you on that. It is very complex and I would be happy to provide that for him in writing.
The member for Macdonnell also made comments about the report which the member for Johnston tabled. I have been advised that this report was actually printed in 1999 but it was not actually released until June 2000, and that it was not publicly released. I have been advised that the health community knew nothing about its release, and that is the context in which the member for Johnston was speaking.
Mr Elferink: Well, it is in the public library. I mean, what am I to assume from that?
Mrs AAGAARD: That is my response to that.
I was a bit disappointed that the member for Port Darwin appeared to be blaming the victim in terms of health. Certainly, this government is very committed to putting in place programs which actually help people to take control of their own health, but it is very important that the government is much more active in preventative health. We think that the government plays a very key role in this and we will not be blaming the victim in the future. It was very interesting that the member for Port Darwin also made the connection between the use of illicit drugs and property crime. I certainly agree with her on that one.
I thank the member for Stuart for his comments on matters relating to the Centre, for his support of this statement and for myself as the minister.
I was very interested to hear the member for Sanderson’s comments about illicit drugs in the northern suburbs of Darwin. They are very similar to the sorts of things that I found when I was doorknocking, and I think it is one of the key reasons why having an adequate illicit drug strategy is going to be so important for the Northern Territory. I thank honourable members for their contribution.
Motion agreed to; statement noted.
ADJOURNMENT
Mr HENDERSON (Industries and Business): Madam Speaker, I move that the Assembly do now adjourn.
Ms CARNEY (Araluen): Madam Speaker, I rise to make comments in relation to answers from the tourism minister this afternoon. I am expressing some anger at this government’s decision not to positively respond to the Flight West proposal - in other words, not to indemnify it. The minister said, when answering questions this afternoon, that he did not have details of the proposal and that is why government would not support it. This is a very curious thing for him to have said because I am advised that details have, in fact, been provided to government. Detailed cash flows and costings were in fact provided to the Department of Transport some weeks ago. It is curious, is it not, that one government minister does not know what is happening in another government department? Clearly, that is the case.
In addition, at a public meeting in the minister’s own electorate some weeks ago, he said that he would not support the Flight West proposal because it is not a federal government issue. I am told he made it very clear that this government would not provide one cent to support the Flight West proposal. Clearly, the minister is unable to get his head around the fact that the collapse of Ansett has profound effects on the Northern Territory and that it is incumbent upon government, regardless of its political colour, to do all that it can to assist the tourism industry.
On Friday last week, the liquidator of Flight West wrote to the minister specifically asking for his support so that Flight West could be up and running. I am inclined to accept that the minister himself did not or has not read that letter. The fact of the matter is that the liquidator of Flight West is wanting this government to assist Flight West to get up and running. This government consistently refuses to help. The Queensland government recognises the importance of tourism and has offered to indemnify Flight West. The Alice Springs Town Council is supportive, and the federal government has agreed to indemnify $380 000 to assist Flight West. Nabalco has offered to support the airline if it gets up and running. This airline will go to a number of regional centres including the Minister for Tourism’s own electorate of Nhulunbuy.
The proposal is a very good one. In essence, it will carry 90 people per day. The Air North proposal, the one that the government has given money to, only carries 30 people. On the day it will start, Darwin will have connections to southern ports via Brisbane. It will be a daily service out of Darwin to Brisbane which will connect with Ansett services to Sydney and Melbourne. It will also go to Alice Springs and Gove. The attraction of the proposal obviously is that it is not Top End heavy in the same way that the Virgin proposal is. The Flight West proposal is a new and exciting initiative and I urge government to reconsider its position and indemnify the liquidator of Flight West to assist Northern Territory tourism.
This government elects to support Sir Richard Branson over local operators, which is a disgrace. The minister said that he did not have enough information. My response to that is that he has a task force, he has recently created a task force. It is up to the task force to get out and about and to talk to the liquidator. It is not for the ordinary person to try to entice government into a proposal which is widely accepted will assist the Northern Territory tourism industry. It is for government to get on top of these issues. This government should get on to govern. It is not a federal government issue; it is one that this government needs to address. This is a Territory issue and the ramifications of the collapse of Ansett are disastrous, and the Minister for Tourism knows it. The proposal, in a nutshell, has been supported by all and sundry. The only outstanding stakeholder that does not support it is the Northern Territory government. It should be ashamed of itself and it is utterly disgraceful.
Having dealt with that issue, while I am on my feet, I would like to address another issue, again expressing my concern about this government’s decision to sell the Cawood Court units in Alice Springs to a developer. Earlier this year, I lobbied the CLP government to close the Cawood Court units on the basis that cluster housing was an outdated concept, and people living in urban areas did not want to live in such areas or, for that matter, live near them. The units, as you would know, Madam Speaker, are the cause of a significant amount of antisocial behaviour. I spoke with many residents, both nearby as well as those people who lived in the units, and the former government undertook to demolish the units as a result of the input I had to the government based on my discussions with residents. In other words, everybody wanted Cawood Court demolished and the former government undertook to do so.
As I said in my maiden speech, there is a shortage of land in Alice Springs, and the previous government intended to release a portion of the site for first home buyers. The remainder was to be developed as a seniors’ village. These commitments had broad and overwhelming support from the people in the area. The units have been a problem for a long time. The former CLP government listened, responded and undertook a plan of action in relation to their concerns. What is disturbing is that I wrote to the Minister for Central Australia on 26 September and asked him to advise what the government planned to do with the site. The response was a sad one because he simply referred me to the Minister for Lands, Planning and Environment.
During the election campaign, the ALP said that they would dispense with the position of Minister for Central Australia and under great pressure from many people in the Centre they eventually agreed to keep the position. The problem however is that the Minister for Central Australia clearly has no idea what is going on there. If an elected member cannot get some sort of response from the Minister for Central Australia, then I hold out very little hope for the people of Alice Springs when or if they go to him seeking an answer to a fairly straight forward question.
In any event, I am still waiting for the Minister for Lands, Planning and Environment to contact me to advise me of his plans, but I need not wait any longer, as the announcement was made last week to sell the complex to a developer. It is a disgrace because there is a glut of units in Alice Springs and it is widely understood that a developer will simply dress up the units and sell them. The market is already saturated so it makes no sense at all that the government would make the decision it has.
In addition, the shortage of land in Alice Springs is almost at crisis point. It is abundantly clear from the decision and the announcement made last week that this ALP government does not support the release of land in Alice Springs. I really feel for first home buyers in particular. I know myself, not so long ago driving around Alice Springs looking for a block of land, I had heard that there was a shortage of land, but to see it for myself was quite an interesting experience. For young couples who are wanting to build their own homes, there is nowhere, essentially, in Alice Springs to do it.
What troubles me over and above all of the matters I have discussed, is who was consulted by this government when it made the decision to sell these units? This party campaigned heavily on the basis that it would consult, consult, consult. It would workshop endlessly on significant government decisions. But in this instance, I am very sad to say, there does not appear to have been any consultation. I would like the minister to let me know who was consulted, if anybody, and to identify those people and whether they were more than just public servants. One thing is certain: the residents were not consulted. I know because they have been e-mailing, faxing and telephoning my office on a daily basis since this decision was made.
I have, for a few weeks, been telling concerned residents that I was doing all that I could to chase the matter up. But of course, when one is waiting for a response from the Minister for Central Australia, who ultimately comes back and says, ‘I am sorry, you need to deal with another minister’, and then, when no response is forthcoming from that other minister, all I can do is tell my constituents that I am doing as much as I can.
This is a government that has told Territorians that it would consult like never before. It has not consulted apparently, and it is a disgrace. I feel very sad about the future of those in Alice Springs if this demonstrates the sort of consultation - or lack of it - that is to be undertaken by this government. There is, I understand, suggestion that part of the site could be used as a centre for renal dialysis. I will be writing to the Minister for Lands, Planning and Environment and asking him to confirm whether or not this is the case.
In conclusion, the CLP government consulted and responded to community concerns. The new government has not consulted and I am terribly disappointed about that. It has come up with a short-term plan to flog off a whole lot of units in a delightful urban area in Alice Springs. It should be ashamed of itself, and I can assure constituents that I will be vigorously pursuing this issue.
Mrs AAGAARD (Nightcliff): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, it is with sorrow that I note the passing of long-term Territorian, Josef Karlhuber. Joe died last Friday at the age of 74 after a long illness. I met Joe in 1986 and have worked with him on many events over the years. Joe’s contribution to the Northern Territory, and that of his family, has been acknowledged in this Assembly previously by the then Chief Minister, Shane Stone. Joe’s story is one that represents many aspects of the enterprise, determination, involvement and hard work that so typifies Northern Territorians. In the 1940s, Joe was a foot soldier in the German army returning to his native Austria, only after two years as a prisoner of war in Russia.
In 1950, Joe came to Australia under a contract to work for a construction company in Perth. Despite being financially exploited as a new and contracted migrant to Australia, Joe applied for citizenship after 18 months. He then established himself as a photographer at Subiaco, moving to Darwin to pursue his profession in 1958. Jim Bowditch from the Northern Territory News offered him the opportunity to set up the photo section in the newspaper in 1960. I understand that Joe was the first full-time photographer employed by the NT News. It is in that capacity that Joe first became widely known and highly regarded, taking that special action shot at sporting and community events.
In 1967, Joe married his wife, Lyn Bleakley, who was originally from Perth. Over time, a number of Lyn’s family members also joined their sister in Darwin, establishing well-known businesses here. In 1971, Joe bought out the well-known photographic business of Lillian Dean. He returned following Cyclone Tracy to rebuild after the business, personal papers, photographs and memorabilia were devastated. In the immediate aftermath of the cyclone, Joe was hired by the Housing Commission to photograph damage caused to Housing Commission houses, recording for posterity the physical impact of that event. Joe was a strong supporter of self-government for the Territory and independence from southern states. This was demonstrated when he introduced colour film processing to the Northern Territory so that film no longer needed to be shipped to Adelaide.
Joe and Lyn have lived in Nightcliff for many years. They have worked with a number of community groups in Darwin including Apex and Rotary. They are foundation members of the German Club and the Edelweiss Shooting Club. Joe especially enjoyed the outdoor life and the occasional fishing trip. I convey my sympathy and that of the Assembly to Lyn, their children, Monica, Manfred, Trevor, Philip, and grandchildren. We will miss him.
Mr MALEY (Goyder): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, I wish to draw honourable members’ attention to a great rural institution, a rural icon that represents all the best qualities of the people of the electorate of Goyder. I am talking, of course, about the mighty Litchfield Bears Rugby League Club. I am proud to say I have had a long involvement with the club, from Under 6s up until recent times, playing in the reserve grade grand final in the early 1990s. Indeed, it is an honour to be the first Litchfield Bear in parliament and I am very proud of that fact. It is something which the club has also taken a great deal of pride in.
The Litchfield Bears Rugby League Club is more than just a club. It is a family. The club and the game of rugby league really produces and instils all the right qualities in our citizens of tomorrow. There is a real team spirit, a real club spirit, and a real community spirit. It has been a big year for the Bears. The season came to an end only recently. The Litchfield Bears did all right. The Under 17s took the premiership flag. Indeed, they received their jumpers at a recent presentation night. The reserve grade, the heart and soul of the club, which includes legends like Mark (Fitzy) Fitzgerald and Luke Marshall and many others, who really are the salt of the earth rural people, an asset to our community. They just missed out on the grand final. It was a huge effort and certainly one they should be proud of.
The A grade side did not fare as well. They, unfortunately, did not get into the grand final. But they are keeping their dream alive; there is next year. There was a huge effort by people like Paul Rubie, who was the coach, and the captain of the A grade side, Mark Buckley. I am reminded of the words of motivational speaker, Dr Ted Tedford, who came up at the beginning of the year from the Institute of Sport. He gave a talk to the club, to the supporters, to the team members, and as he quite properly said, ‘Keep the dream alive’ and that is what it is all about. Unfortuantely, it is sad to note that Dr Tedford has developed a problem with kava abuse. He is dealing with that and hopefully he will be back to give us some sort of motivational talk again early next year.
While the Bears are in hibernation over the Wet Season, over the off season, the numerous rugby league widows will get their men back at least until early next year. The engine room of the club however is of course the juniors, the Little Bears and the Bearettes. Indeed, there are two or three sides of Little Bears in some of the junior grades and there is no doubt that the future of the Litchfield Bears Rugby League Club and indeed certainly the senior sides is embodied in the junior competition, the Bearettes and the Bears which currently play.
The club has a strong committee, and president in John Bell. The balance of the committee are all volunteers, all people who work hard, who give up countless hours during the week and on the weekends to help rural people. There are people like Tuppy and Bobby who work behind the bar and people like Jeff Rees who constantly chase sponsors, all do a fantastic job.
I thank members for listening to my words and I wholeheartedly support and commend the Litchfield Bears and the qualities that they represent to all members of the Chamber. The catch-cry of the Litchfield Bears is, of course: Go, you Bears!
There is one other matter that I would like to draw to members’ attention. Some of my colleagues in this Chamber may not be aware that the electorate of Goyder really varies as much as its demographics. It is some 52 000 km. It covers an enormous portion of land and I am blest to represent the people who live there. There are many different areas. One of the areas that I would like to draw members’ attention to is the Dundee region. Dundee is one of the jewels of the electorate of Goyder. Whilst there are only approximately 150 or so people on the Electoral Roll, the numbers swell each weekend to about 1500. Indeed, there are many people who live in the northern suburbs and other portions of the electorate of Goyder and Nelson who own blocks out there and frequently travel out with their friends and family for fishing and outdoor excursions.
There is a real sense of anticipation and expectation. There is a rock solid promise that the people of Dundee have; it is in writing. It is a real commitment that in this term of government, they will received their tar road and their power. They are looking forward to that and I am very pleased to hear that those promises have been reaffirmed in this Chamber in a very general way during the course of the first sittings of this parliament. The work, however, does not stop there. There are other issues that need to be addressed in the Dundee region – and I am not going to go through them in an exhaustive fashion - but issues like the water problem needs to be addressed. I suspect that at the end of the day there will need to be some real planning about doing the work to articulate town water, mains water into the Dundee region. There is a Dundee Progress Association which has been up and running for a number of years. They are a dedicated group of locals who have done a lot of work and have the interests of Dundee close to their heart, people like George Puls, the former and most recent past president and the current president, Ian Stewart and the balance of the committee do a fantastic job in their work and dedication to the area should be commended.
Dundee and the development of the infrastructure which I have touched upon is a priority and should remain a priority for the government. I will certainly continue to fight hard for the people of the Dundee and Bynoe Haven regions to ensure that the facilities they so properly deserve are eventually made available to them.
Another important area of the electorate of Goyder is that of Cox Peninsula or Wagait Beach. Wagait Beach is probably one of Darwin’s best kept secrets. It is no wonder that there are several long-time Darwin identities living there, people like Darwin legend, Stem Edwards. Everyone knows Stem; everyone likes him. He is the type of bloke who has made a huge contribution to the social fabric of the Northern Territory and Darwin. He is certainly a character and a well-known identity in the Wagait community.
The Cox Peninsula Community Government Council also do a fantastic job. There is a real sense of community there. That was evident recently when I attended the Federation Day celebrations at Wagait Beach. There is little doubt that the amount of effort that local people put into those celebrations was an example for the rest of the people in the Northern Territory. They received some support from government in terms of funding and also they, of course, received some funding from their local council and, coupled with the contributions in time and effort, they were able to put on a fantastic event.
There are several matters which must still be addressed if the Wagait Beach area is to develop even further and one of those is water. Currently, the spring water runs dangerously low towards the end of the Dry and water has to be carted in from Darwin River. This needs to be addressed for Wagait to really take the next step in its developmental road. Also, the last 22km of the Cox Peninsula Road need to be sealed to ensure all year round access and a safer road. There are too many accidents on that road. I look forward to a commitment from government in the November mini-budget that before some of the competing priorities like $60m to bury power lines in the northern suburbs are given the go ahead, that these priorities, such as the ones that I have articulated for Wagait Beach, are seriously considered and dealt with. I am asking members of this Chamber to get behind the good people of Cox Peninsula and Wagait Beach.
I am indebted to Stem Edwards for his advice and his assistance in bringing this issue to a head: that is the construction of a boat ramp beside the existing wharf. There were initially plans for just a single lane boat ramp. After talking to Stem, who is an esteemed fisherman and keen boat person, he quite properly pointed out that it needs to be a double lane boat ramp, and I understand that the plans are well and truly in train to build that boat ramp. It would assist transport difficulties and the loading and unloading of boat difficulties which people who live at Wagait Beach, Belyuen and the Cox Peninsula area endure at the moment.
Mrs BRAHAM (Braitling): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, I note the two seconds that the member for Goyder spoke for, that he told me about. I would like to make comment tonight about two forums that I spoke at recently, both extremely interesting and both quite different. I spoke at the Christian Schools Association National Forum in Alice Springs. Jack Mechielsen, who is the Chief Executive Officer in Darwin, invited me along to address the delegates who came from all around Australia. As you are probably aware, the growth of the Christian Schools Association in the Territory has been quite remarkable in a short time. There are now six of them: one in Alice Springs, which is Araluen; then we have Litchfield, Marrara, Nhulunbuy, the Northern Territory Christian College and the Palmerston Christian School.
The Northern Territory government has always been very supportive of the growth of the private system in the Northern Territory. It has been a productive policy because we have had a growth of independent schools and the diversity of what they offer gives parents a choice of education for their children. There is no doubt in my mind the capital assistance grants that the previous government had implemented was most generous and enabled independent schools to grow and construct facilities with some degree of security. We all acknowledge the cost of building in the Territory is very high so there needs to be some incentives to get the private sector into the Territory. You need to understand that private school systems in the Northern Territory are not very old. In other states, private schools have been there for generations and as they have been developed, beneficiaries have contributed, the buildings and facilities have grown, so, of course, they have become quite wealthy. But, in the Northern Territory, funding by the government is critical, and I believe the review that started so long ago is not completed. I know there are many schools out there waiting to see what will happen as a result of the new Cabinet when they consider that review.
I understand that the main thrust these days, with money being tight, is that private schools and government schools should have good management and business planning. There is a need, though, to work together more cooperatively. Government and non-government schools need to make sure they plan together so there is not duplication or over supply by either party in the education arena. Of course, the challenge for this government will be in dispersing future funding to cover enrolment growth, not perhaps the enrolment shift that we have seen. Alice Springs’ population has not grown for some time and what has happened is that there are shifts in enrolment from school to school as a new principal comes in and gets established and shows strong leadership. What we do not need is duplication of facilities. What we do need is the maintenance of a good public school system, but also a choice of non-government schools which want to offer an alternative education.
Talking to this conference, these people were very aware of how money these days is tight, and how they would need to justify when they were going to build a new facility, that it was, in fact, needed. As the Territory population has grown so quickly, particularly up here in Darwin and Palmerston, we have seen this need for new schools. It is important that these schools can establish themselves so parents have a choice. They also need to show good leadership and perhaps a little bit of an entrepreneurial approach, to make sure they offer something special to parents out there to capture some of the market. It is not a simple thing these days to establish a new school. There are many pressures put on schools and I would hope that this pressure would not detract from the primary purpose of the school, that they would not end up with gimmicks, that they would be offering a good education. This group of Christian school CEOs, from my perspective, do have quite an important part to play in offering that different choice to parents within our community. Certainly the values they espouse, the community values, the values of respect and right and wrong, are the kind of values that we can all understand and appreciate.
I also talked to them about the need to look at curriculum and prioritising. We talked before about the overload of the curriculum at the moment and how schools really need to, in a way, cull and determine what exactly they want to teach. I am a proponent of back to basics and believe basic skills are important if you are going to go on with education for the rest of your life. I see that these schools have a strong commitment also to teaching children the basics so they will have the skills for future learning. I have to admit that I sometimes despair of the Australian education system that slavishly follows overseas trends, often after they have been proved unsuccessful. We have a push at the moment in the system for frameworks and I just wondered after a huge amount of time schools gave to profiles, what next will come up.
When you talk to people like this who are so dedicated, when you know there are parents out there willing to pay extra for a special education, you have to admire the fact that they are willing to go into a community and start afresh. You have to admire teachers today for taking on the task of teaching, it is not simple; and principals have to show good leadership. I commend the Christian Schools Association for the work they are doing within our communities. I know the conference was a great success. People there were very much won over by the Centre, and showed significant interest in the Northern Territory. I thank Jack Mechielsen for his invitation.
The other conference that I attended and opened was quite different. It was called ALSO. ALSO stands for Advanced Life Support in Obstetrics. Anything we can do to make a birth for a mother or a baby safer has to be a very good thing. Early this year, Helen Baldwin, who is the Maternal and Infant Health Educator in the Alice Springs and Central region, was invited to take part in the inaugural Australian Advanced Life Support in Obstetrics course in Canberra. There were 24 specially invited obstetricians, midwives, general practitioners and neo-natalologists who undertook and passed that course. This course is not a simple course; it is a very difficult course. There is a written exam at the end of it. They are quite selective in who they offer it to, and then they select people they can train to be instructors. This of course was a first for the Territory having it in Alice Springs. There were approximately 58 participants who gave up their weekend to attend the course. The people who are the instructors do it free of charge, that is, their travel and accommodation is cared for but they charge nothing for the work they do. You have to admire, very much, that they are willing to do that travel around Australia. From that course in Alice Springs, we hope there will be a bank of people who will then be instructors and then it will be finally offered in Darwin, and so the work will grow.
I went around the different workstations that they had. It is so intensive that often it is just one lecturer to four people, working through a particular element of that course in safe delivery. The course itself could be applied to so many instances in the Territory. There are so many opportunities for us to have these people trained in emergency birth situations, and basically the course is there to ensure people do not panic, that they know a simple procedure to go through to make sure the birth at the end of the day, is successful. With our statistics in mortalities and what-have-you, this can only but help and assist.
I was impressed at the number of people at the course, but also the diverse range. There were specialist nurses, midwives, you name it, and all these people had come together at the weekend to participate. It is an interesting course. It was originated in the United States in 1991, and it has been adapted to suit the needs of thousands of practitioners around the world in such countries as the United Kingdom, Canada, Brazil, Germany, Belgium and Nepal. Australia has come in a bit later but they are endeavouring to build up this bank of instructors. Some of the instructors who were there came from America and New Zealand. If we eventually have our bank of instructors within Australia, they will be able to offer it at many places.
I just thought it was a great initiative and I commend Professor Jed Williams. Jed is the Executive Director of Nursing in the Alice Springs Hospital and it was his initiative that enabled this course to come together and he obtained the funding through the Commonwealth. It was quite an expensive course. The registration fees are over $800. So it is a credit to Jed that he has been able to do this. I must commend Helen Baldwin also, who did that course originally and has come back so enthusiastic so that people in the Territory can benefit from this particular course. At the end of the day, we hope the benefits will be for the mothers and babies and we will see safe deliveries.
Ms MARTIN (Fannie Bay): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, as the Minister for Senior Territorians and member for Fannie Bay, I rise to pay tribute tonight to a woman who, until her death a few weeks ago, was perhaps our most senior Territorian, and certainly one of our most tenacious, optimistic and inspiring Territory pioneers. She was Eileen Marjorie Fitzer, whose remarkable life spanned a century and who died on 27 August, just seven months short of her 100th birthday. I was privileged to have had Eileen as my constituent and was always uplifted and inspired by my visits to her at her unit in Kurringal Flats, and more recently at the Salvation Army Nursing Home.
Ever alert and smiling, despite being quite physically restricted in recent years, she would say, ‘I’m never lonely; I live on my memories’, and what amazing memories they were. I would like to take a few moments this evening to place on the public record my personal appreciation, and I am sure that of most Territorians, for the very substantial contribution Eileen Fitzer made to the Territory throughout the last century. Eileen played many roles during her lifetime: entertainer, political activist, pioneer nurse, policeman’s wife and partner, remote outback hostess, faithful friend and mentor.
Conceived as Australia was forming itself as a nation, Eileen was born in Darwin on 30 March 1902, to Eleanor and Tom Styles. She was extremely proud of her pioneering stock, her Darwin-born mother was the daughter of Ned and Eliza Tuckwell, who are among the Territory’s earliest European settlers, and from whom Eileen inherited her strong spirit. Ned, who had been part of the South Australian expedition to establish a settlement at Escape Cliffs from 1864 to 1866, arrived in Darwin with George Goyder’s South Australian survey party in 1868.
Eliza, a Cockney who had immigrated to Adelaide as a servant girl in 1855, arrived with their four children on the first ship to carry passengers to the Territory in January 1870. To help pay the bills, Eliza took in washing and acted as a midwife, while Ned worked on most of the city’s early buildings, including the first Government Residence. Eileen’s mother, Eleanor, was born at the camp in Darwin in 1873, and spent her childhood and teenage years here. In 1893, at the age of 19, she married English-born Tom Styles, and moved with him to Brock’s Creek, where he was the underground manager for the Zapopan mine.
By the time Eileen arrived on the scene, her mother had given birth to five children, three of whom died in infancy. Following Eileen’s birth, Eleanor had another son, who also died as an infant, and another daughter. Eileen was proud of the fact that her grandmother and her mother were among the first Australian women to vote after South Australia passed the necessary legislation in 1894, and she would have been pleased to see the percentage of women in parliament increase substantially in the last Territory election. She spoke enthusiastically and vividly of the rich cultural life she experienced with her family, of travelling through the exotic Chinatown on the edge of Brock’s Creek, and of days filled with singing and dancing, led by her father’s rich voice and her mother’s lively concertina playing. She remembered an early birthday the community gave for her, when guests danced on antbed and ash floors, and of the following morning when Eileen and her sisters had to sweep up all the dust.
School was in a tiny house at Brock’s Creek, where the five students had a tin whistle band. Sometimes Eileen and her musical sister, Myrtle, used to entertain the others by putting dusters on their heads and signing Two Little Girls in Blue. When Eileen was eight, her mother died of cancer, and Eileen and her sister, Gertrude, were sent to the Darwin convent school where Eileen earned top marks and became an accomplished seamstress. Her other two sisters, Lillian and Myrtle, lived with their grandmother who had run a boarding house called Resolution Villa ever since her husband’s death in 1882.
A staunch Methodist, Eliza lived across the street from the historic Wesleyan Church, which she attended regularly. Eileen had vivid memories of her grandmother as a little lady always wearing a black bonnet and shawl, sitting in a rocker on the veranda and singing hymns in the latter years of her life. She also recalled the adventure of being a child in Darwin, of playing cowboys and indians down at Fort Hill and exploring Chinatown, then in the heart of Cavenagh Street. Eileen described it as the most fabulous place in the world and the Chinese New Year celebration as the most exciting time in a European child’s life.
During the First World War, in which her brother, Walter, died on the battlefields of France, Eileen and her sisters moved to Pine Creek to be with their father who, Eileen claimed, probably greased every nut and bolt on the Pine Creek railway. When Eileen finished school at the age of 12, as there was no further schooling available in Pine Creek, she took a job as a nursemaid at 10 shillings a week. She remembered her devastation when the family got a letter from the Army informing them that her brother had been killed on the battlefields of France, the first Territory boy to die in the war. The letter from the Army said he was engaged on a mission when, without warning, a machine gun opened fire and he was hit in two places. They said he was most heroic in the manner in which he bore great pain and was an example to many a hardened soldier.
After the war, the girls moved to a bachelor pad in Darwin where they were extremely popular and active in all areas of the community and served on the ANZAC Day committee when the community constructed a monument to the Territory boys who had lost their lives in the war. Eileen got a job as a salesgirl at the large European shop of Jolly’s and earned herself a reputation as an entertainer of note. After one of her performances, the local paper said that, ‘If Miss Eileen Styles went to America, she would be snapped up by an enterprising picture film man’.
Eileen, who used to described herself as a bit of a rebel and game for anything, became a political activist when she was 19. In 1921, Eileen, who had grown up in a strong Labor household, brought roast dinners to leading citizens who went to gaol in a successful ‘no taxation without representation’ fight. Then she drove a sulky all over Darwin campaigning for one of those citizens, union and Labor leader Harold Nelson, who became the Territory’s first member of federal parliament in 1922. Eileen carried on the tradition and remained a staunch supporter of Labor all her life. It was very rewarding and satisfying to me personally, as her local member, that she lived just long enough to see Labor finally win government for the first time in the Territory.
Eileen’s political interests eventually took second place to the profession she chose to follow. In 1927, Eileen’s sister, Gertrude, financed her to do a nursing course in Melbourne where she initially had problems with her feet because she wasn’t used to walking on the pavement. After nursing school, she did midwifery at the Queen Victoria. The week she got her successful results, she caught the train to Alice Springs, so anxious was she to return to the Territory. At Alice Springs, she carried out pioneer work at The Bungalow, working with Stolen Generation children suffering from eye disease. In 1934, she was transferred to Pine Creek as Sister-in-Charge of the hospital where she said most of her cases were caused by mining accidents or pub fights. She was visited at least once a week by the famous flying doctor, Clyde Fenton, who was stationed in Katherine. A practical joker as well as an amazing pilot, Fenton often involved Eileen in his flying stunts.
In 1936, Eileen married a long time friend, World War I veteran Harry Gribbons whom she affectionately referred to as her ‘wild Irishman’. In late 1938, they went to the Wauchope wolfram mining fields near Tennant Creek. For the next 18 months, Eileen was the only European woman on the fields and was often called on to nurse sick miners, mostly with eye problems. Here she lived in what she whimsically referred to as ‘The Mansion’, which was in reality a tiny shed with the floor made of shavings and filings from the mine. She always wore a pith helmet with a fly veil on it and served meals under a large mosquito net to keep the flies off.
Eileen was next asked to relieve the nursing sister at Channel Island leprosarium for a few months where she looked after about 120 lepers. This was followed by another job as the Matron at the then new Bagot Aboriginal compound in Darwin. Some time later, she and Harry bought the Adelaide River Hotel which they ran until late 1941 when Harry became extremely ill and they were evacuated to Sydney on the USS Grant with about 250 women and children. Once Eileen got her husband settled in Sydney, she successfully sought permission to return to Adelaide River to settle up the business affairs. She caught the train to Alice Springs and then travelled in a truck convoy to Adelaide River where she was the only civilian woman.
After handing over her hotel furniture to the nurses, Eileen returned to Sydney where she remained with her husband until he died in early 1943. A short time later, she got a telegram from the Byrne family at Tipperary Station inviting her to come and live with them as a nurse. She jumped at the chance to return to the Territory. It was while she was there that Eileen renewed her friendship with one of the Territory’s most famous policemen, Tas Fitzer, then the Officer In Charge of the Daly River police station. A romance blossomed and in April 1945, Tas and Eileen were married at Tipperary Station in a ceremony which lasted for three days.
After the wedding the couple moved to their home on the Daly River where Tas was stationed as a policeman. Eileen soon became known as the ‘white queen of the Daly’ and she was hostess to many of the military serving in the area. She made headlines across Australia when she became desperately ill one Wet Season and was dramatically rescued by a boom defence vessel which battled raging floods to bring Father Frank Flynn to her aid.
Eileen’s famous good nature and generosity continued later at Timber Creek, where the couple served until 1955 when Tas retired and they moved to Sydney for health reasons. When Tas died in 1966, Eileen returned to her beloved Territory where she lived for many years at Kurringal Flats, making several extended trips overseas. On one visit she had tea at Buckingham Palace after receiving an MBE for her services to nursing and the community.
Earlier this year, she moved to the Salvation Army Nursing Home where she got a renewed lease of life and was fond of telling visitors that she was still fighting fit. In her typical spirited style, Eileen began planning for her historic exit more than 20 years ago when she sought and received permission from the Darwin City Council to be buried in the Goyder Road Cemetery with her grandfather Ned Tuckwell who died in 1882, her mother Eleanor Styles who died in 1910, and her grandmother who died in 1921. When the cemetery was placed on the NT Heritage Register in 1997, the then 95-year-old made sure she had the permission of the Lands, Planning and Environment Minister for her family to carry out her last wishes of being buried with her pioneering family.
She left instructions that when she died she wanted people to celebrate, not mourn, her life. She often used to say, ‘I have had a wonderful life and I have no regrets. I want people to be happy’. Dutifully, on 3 September, a host of family and friends attended Eileen’s funeral mass at St Mary’s Catholic Cathedral, followed by her special burial at the old cemetery which was reopened for the occasion, and later a wake at the Sailing Club, celebrating that lucky life.
While we record our regret at the passing of her remarkable life, we can be grateful that her life story has been richly recorded in oral histories, books, and many feature articles. It is indeed fitting that a few weeks before her death, Eileen was guest of honour at a special function at the Museum and Art Gallery, which had been featuring the small but significant exhibition called Threads of History. It was a display of four delicate embroidered linen signature cloths created by women in the Top End between 1901 and 1940, including two made by Eileen in 1913 and 1923, the latter being the occasion of her 21st birthday.
It is worth repeating what the Northern Territory newspaper said about Eileen at the time, and I quote from the 7 April 1923 edition:
- The 21st birthday of Miss Eileen Styles, one of the most popular girls in the Northern Territory, was celebrated
with great elat in the Soldiers’ Memorial Hall on Saturday night last. The guests represented every wholesome
section of the community, and Eileen was the recipient of tangible tokens of affection from all her youthful
friends and practical demonstrations of sincere regard from those who have known her since childhood.
Buoyant good nature combined with conspicuous generosity and a considerable amount of ability has made
Eileen a figure in local life and as a product of the soil, the people of the place are evidently proud of her.
That pride still holds true today, nearly 80 years later. Ironically, Eileen died the day the exhibit was dismantled. There is no doubt that her family’s very significant threads of history will live on in the fifth generation Territory-born descendants of the pioneering Tuckwell family such as the Rixons, the Lovegroves, the Fawcetts and the Eastons, and in the memories of the hundreds of people whose life Eileen Fitzer touched.
So, from this parliament, we say, ‘Vale, Eileen’. May we all learn from your rich and rewarding life and your ever-optimistic and inspiring spirit. May your life and spirit serve to remind us of the very substantial resource our senior citizens are in building this better Territory.
I would like to give my thanks to historian, Barbara James, for that history. She has recorded a lot of the history of some of our pioneers, and certainly recorded Eileen’s with a great passion. My thanks to Barbara, and farewell to Eileen.
Mr VATSKALIS (Casuarina): Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, I rise to speak in this adjournment on a number of issues. First of all, I would like to say that a few days ago I attended a barbecue organised by the Islamic Society in Darwin, at which you were present as well together with a number of other parliamentary colleagues. It was a fantastic evening. More than 400 people attended the barbecue, and that showed the rest of the nation how people of different origin and different creed can be together and stand next to each other in harmony in Darwin.
Christians, Buddhists and Muslims stood together, united in their condemnation of terrorism and also united and supporting each other. I am very pleased to announce that the Territory community was very wise and very mature in not taking any action against our Muslim brothers in contrast to what happened in other states in Australia - notably in Queensland where a mosque was fire-bombed. We had some unfortunate incidents, of course, but this was counteracted by equally generous gestures from the community when flowers were placed at the front door of the mosque and phone calls of support were received by the President of the Islamic Society.
After all, people of Muslim faith have been with us for a long number of years. I was in Port Hedland a few years back, and travelling between Port Hedland and Broome I found a number of date palms standing in the middle of the desert. Going back and looking at the history I found out that Afghan camel drivers, or caravan drivers, used to stay by that spring and they used to eat dates. Of course, the date seeds fell on the ground and sprouted and you have a number of date palms in the middle of the desert, something you do not see anywhere else in Australia. I also had the pleasure to work with a person whose name is William Mohammed Ah Mat. He is an Aboriginal Territorian with an English first name and Muslim second name and he is quite proud to say that his origin is from the Afghan camel drivers. We have the train that is named after the camel drivers, the Ghan in Alice Springs. I have to say that the contribution of these Muslim Afghanis during the development of the Territory was significant.
They share the same history with us, the same history with Territorians of Greek, Italian and Chinese descent, who have made the Territory their home. I associated closely with people of Islamic faith in my previous life in the public service, and nothing mattered. It did not matter what faith they were, where they were coming from. What really mattered was how well they could do the job, and I respected them for their efforts and I respected them for the way they keep the traditions and the way they look after their families and bring up their children.
I congratulate the Islamic Society for this barbecue. It was a fantastic evening and I congratulate all Territorians and the people of Darwin who attended that barbecue that night.
On the same matter of multiculturalism, I want to speak about another function - if I can call it that - an official opening of the BP Minimart and Dick Smith electrical store in my electorate in Casuarina. There is nothing important about opening a new petrol station and a new electrical store. What is important is the people behind this development, Mr Theo and Mr Chris Voudouris. I am honoured to call Mr Voudouris my friend; both the Voudouris, the senior and junior are my friends. It is a typical story of people who came from the other side of the world penniless and they made a good life in Australia, and they give something back to the community. Theodore Voudouris’ family, especially his father, Chris, who was a barber in Alexandria, Egypt - one of the oldest Greek communities in the world. He was a very well respected member of the Alexandria Greek community and the Egyptian community. He was so well respected that Theo told me recently, when he went to Alexandria a few years back, he found that the barber shop still stood there and the Egyptian barber who knew his father and was a good friend of his father, had kept the electricity bills under his father’s name, under Chris Voudouris’ name, because he did not want to change the name of the barber shop. It was a very interesting story to hear, and Theo was very, very moved by this sign of kindness by the Egyptian barber.
They arrived in Australia about 50 years ago. Theo went to school, was educated, his father got involved with business and Theo joined the public service. He married Fotini and, according to Theo, he made a very wise decision soon afterwards - he filed for divorce. He filed for divorce from the public service and he decided to go alone into business. With his wife, Fotini, and a very young family, they purchased their first business which was a small minimart in Canberra. Soon they acquired the competitors minimart in the same area and the rest is history.
Just before the cyclone, Theo was looking around Australia for places to invest the money he made in Canberra and he recognised Darwin as a place for opportunity. He came here, he brought his wife and the children here and they decided to invest their fortunes in the Territory. And of course, that decision paid back. Theo has many investments in other states in Australia but the majority of his investments are in the Territory. Theo has a very original idea. He will not start from scratch developing places but instead he will redevelop existing properties and he will develop them in a way that complement the environment and complement the area and will become user friendly so people can find them very easily, can utilise them very easily and also can benefit by it. The present remodelling and the redevelopment of the BP Minimart is an indication of Theo’s ingenuity.
Theo is not a person who - how can I put it? - does things the easy way. When his son, Chris, grew up and he decided to go into business, Theo put him in his business, but at the bottom. Chris, his son, had to work his way through every level in his business and now he is a partner with this father. Equal partner is Theo’s wife, Fotini. They have always worked together, and she has been great support for Theo and for their son, Chris.
As I said before, Theo’s story is a typical story of the migrant who came to Australia, made Australia their home and they have benefited Australia and, at the same time, have enriched Australia with their culture and their dedication and, of course, the progress and advancement they made here. I was very pleased to be at the opening and I was very pleased to see the Voudouris family feeling very proud of what they achieved.
Mr Acting Deputy Speaker, as a member of Greek community, I am also proud of the achievement a fellow Greek Australian has made here in the Territory.
Motion agreed to; the Assembly adjourned.
Last updated: 04 Aug 2016