Parliamentary Committees

SELECT COMMITTEE ON PROPOSED SALE AND REDEVELOPMENT OF THE GLENSIDE HOSPITAL SITE

Adjourned debate on motion of Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins:

That the report of the select committee be noted.

(Continued from 18 February 2009. Page 1332.)

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER (17:33): I will speak very briefly on the report of the Select Committee on Proposed Sale and Redevelopment of the Glenside Hospital Site, following on from the contributions of the Hons Mr Dawkins and Ms Lensink. While I may live to regret this, I speak on behalf of myself and the Hon. Mr Finnigan. We are both very pleased—

The Hon. B.V. Finnigan: I'm always very pleased to speak on your behalf.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: I know you are, Bernard, and I'm returning the favour today. We are both very pleased with the conduct of the inquiry and with the subsequent report, with some exceptions, which we note in our dissenting report, which I will come to presently.

First, I thank the staff of the committee, Mr Guy Dickson and Ms Geraldine Sladden, for their wonderful resourcing of this inquiry, and I also thank all the committee members for what I thought was a very useful exercise and all those who took their time to contribute to the process by making submissions.

Briefly, I would like to address some of the areas on which the Hon. Mr Finnigan and I differ from the views of the majority of the committee. It was a very narrow majority, I should say. Neither the Hon. Mr Finnigan nor I believe that the members received in any way of evidence sufficient information or expert advice to determine how many beds should be provided in a relocation of the facilities, as outlined in recommendations 4 and 6. Some general statements of claim were made to the committee, but they were not in our view backed with the necessary expertise and, as such, the committee recommendation that the number of beds should be doubled appears to be an arbitrary decision. It was very easy to make such a recommendation, but we do not believe the committee members had sufficient information before them to do so and, as such, recommendations 4 and 6 are in our view completely arbitrary.

The Hon. Mr Finnigan and I concur in expert evidence given to the committee by Monsignor David Cappo that the Victorian era style of stand-alone lunatic asylum is no longer the preferred model of service delivery for mental health and, therefore, plans to integrate mental health services as much as possible into normal life should be supported. To be fair to the other committee members, I think they also agree with this proposition. However, local community politics being what it is, some of them became enmeshed in community opposition to the sale of the land.

To our minds—that is, the Hon. Mr. Finnigan and myself—there was no real basis for recommendation 7, which calls for the retention of the asylum orchard. Frankly, I believe that was just silly. No orchards are kept indefinitely; fruit trees become old and diseased and are replaced with hardy varieties over time, and it is absurd to say that this old, diseased and dying fruit orchard should be retained for posterity—even if its location is better placed for some public mental health provisions. This demonstrated the nonsensical level some opposition has reached and in which, I believe, some members of the committee have, perhaps, been caught up.

I think it is fair to say that the major concern raised with the committee—or at least the concern raised by most people, which could be a decidedly different thing—is the sale of some parts of the site for residential and commercial redevelopment. I believe this concern lies at the heart of claims of inadequate consultation. Frankly, I do not believe that such a charge can be sustained and, while I understand that those people out there who outright oppose the Glenside site redevelopment might feel that their opinions have not been sufficiently heard and weighed, I cannot help but think that the claims of inadequate consultation are merely a result the fact that their views were not reflected in the final outcome. This is a natural and understandable reaction, but let us not make more of it than that, and let us not forget that the previous Liberal government also sold off some of this land for residential development, and that has worked extremely well.

Having said all of that, and notwithstanding our dissent with the majority report, the Hon. Mr. Finnigan and I are happy to associate ourselves with the inquiry and the remainder of the report. I commend the motion to the council.

Motion carried.