Sid Sidebottom (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Tonight I am really pleased to discuss two aged-care facilities which I had the great privilege of opening in the last few months. Both are great examples of community self-help. Both are examples of community based not-for-profit organisations that are trying to look to the future and are looking to government—they have certainly looked to their community and got support—to consolidate and reinforce the belief in community based not-for-profit organisations. We need to and will support them into the future. The area I come from, unfortunately, has a markedly ageing population—one of the highest and fastest-growing aged populations in Tasmania and one of the fastest growing in Australia. The services these facilities provide are first class, but they are going to need support. It is very much an issue for both sides of this House. We all have aged-care communities in our electorates and we need to be able to help them sustain their services into the future.

The first facility I had the great privilege of opening was Emmerton Park in the far north-west of Tasmania on 29 April. Mr Speaker, you know it well because you visited it many, many years ago when you were kind enough to support me as a lowly candidate in the 1998 election when I had the great privilege of being first elected to this place.

You might not remember, Mr Speaker, but Emmerton Park was in a 40-year-old motel and they developed services from there, but it became so large and the demand was so large that the demand on the facility to reach standards was too much. So you would be very pleased to know that they have built an $8 million-plus facility to cater for 60 beds for the full range of services, and most of it came from the community. But the federal government kindly—and I recognise both the former government and ours for this—was able to contribute $2.5 million towards it. The state government contributed $1 million towards the cost of it and the local community contributed nearly $800,000. The rest was raised by the community itself and the local government. So I congratulate Jonathan Smith and his board and the mayor, Daryl Quilliam, on the creation of Emmerton Park, the 60-bed supermotel. The things they have in them nowadays—it is a credit to them and a credit to that wonderful community in the far north-west. I hope you all have the opportunity to go up that way and visit sometime.

Mr Speaker, you would also be aware of another facility that is located in Burnie. It is called Umina Park. ‘Umina’ is a beautiful name, because it means ‘repose’, which is a great description of what it means to be in this home. Again, it was built for around $8 million and is part of OneCare, which has now consolidated itself in Tasmania. The new wing, Westpark Grove, provides 40 beds and a full range of low care, in the main, through to high care and high-care dependency and secure wings. Of course, Umina Park itself, which has something like 198 residents, has the full suite of services, which is going to be the future. You are going to have gated communities, where you go in and start to purchase services of support until you move on to the lower but dependent care, to high care, to high dependent care and—hopefully not for anyone here—to dementia care itself. That is, first and foremost, part and parcel of what is going on.

I congratulate OneCare. I congratulate Roz Hill, who is a director at Umina, Michael Powell, the chair of the board, and Jeff Briscoe, who is the chair of OneCare in Tasmania, for their excellent work and the wonderful contribution they make to their communities. They look to this place to help them provide these services into the future. Looking around this House, I know that everyone here cares and that it is something we need to look to in the future. It was a great honour to open both these magnificent homes for the aged.