Clark DavidHon Dr DAVID CLARK (Minister of Health): Thank you Madam Chair. I want to put a few comments on record as there have been a number of speeches made by members of the Opposition some of them on a previous day that the committee sat and correct a few things for the record. The Hon Michael Woodhouse in his opening contribution—I appreciate he hasn't been the Opposition health spokesperson for a long time—made the claim that Labour in Opposition had said the health budget was $8 billion short. That's not quite accurate. We had some research done in Opposition that suggested the health budget was $2.3 billion short just to achieve the existing level of services in the health system that it had been short-funded and that with a growing ageing population with more complex needs and increasing demand the funding had not kept up with the pace. So it was actually now harder to get access to services than it used to be. What we saw under the previous Government was a health system that was drifting and that was in decline. With the underfunding it struggled to keep up and New Zealanders saw that. They saw that they couldn't get the services they used to be able to get because the funding simply wasn't there to deliver them.So that's why this Government campaigned as the previous member said on putting $8 billion more into the health system. This Government is committed over the forecast period to putting $8 billion into the health system which over time contributes that $2.3 billion that they cut out back in and it adds new funding in as well recognising that growing ageing population. That's the pledge we have made and we'll be held to account on that over the forecast period.But of course we can't fix everything in one Budget. The levels of neglect and the nine years of neglect can't be addressed in one Budget. Nobody pretends that it can be. Nobody pretends you can magic up a workforce when it's been run down under the previous Government's watch while they had just let it drift and decline.But this Government is committed to the public delivery of health services. We have determined that we will take measures straight away. We will do things like invest in mental health in a way that the previous Government never did. They seemed content again to let that drift and get worse and worse and to let the wait times get longer for mental health services. They did not take action despite—CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): I'm sorry to interrupt the Minister but we are on the Estimates which is about what the Government is going to do and not necessarily—we've had half your five minutes now on the previous Government so can you focus on what you're doing.Hon Dr DAVID CLARK: I will come back to the reason why we're responding. What we have committed to in the Budget therefore is to already put in some integrated therapies: a pilot programme for 18- to 25-year-olds—more than $10 million over the next three years—which makes counselling and therapy available for young people. We've invested $28 million over the next three years to better support Canterbury kids to mean that every primary school - age child in Canterbury will have access to a mental health worker and we've put $17 million over the next four years into expanding school-based health services which is the next step in rolling out the nurses in schools programme. Quite aside from that of course we've launched the mental health and addiction inquiry which reports back in just a couple of months and will project the way forward for future Budgets and commitments that will be made to make sure that we spend the money well.One of the other significant things that was done in the Budget which will benefit those with mental health issues is the reduction in fees for community services card holders—540000 more New Zealanders will have access to doctors visits under $20. For many of them that will mean a saving of $20 or $30 per visit and for some of them a saving of up to $50 per visit. So they will actually be able to access a GP and for many that is the way into mental health services. They get the initial consultation that puts them in a position to get access to mental health services. So that's a really important initiative on mental health.A number of speakers have mentioned the $100 million contingency the previous Government had put forward so I do want to address that and say that that money was never appropriated. No money was ever appropriated for programmes. They were in the realm of nice ideas. That Government had nine years to act and did not.