Jane Prentice (Ryan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) acknowledges that the MV YWAM PNG was commissioned by Papua New Guinea Prime Minister, the Hon. Peter O'Neill MP, on 21 April 2015;

(2) notes that the ship has been tasked with providing health care and medical training to remote coastal villages in Western Province and Gulf Province, Papua New Guinea;

(3) understands that the new ship will allow Youth with a Mission Medical Ships Australia (YWAM MSA) to reach more villages and to deliver more timely treatment in a more appropriate clinical setting;

(4) recognises the tireless efforts of YWAM MSA to raise awareness of the need for funds to support the work of the ship and its crew of volunteers; and

(5) notes that the Australian Government has contributed funding of $2 million over four years towards this worthy project.

Papua New Guinea is Australia's nearest neighbour. It is a young and developing nation and, like many developing nations, its 7.3 million residents suffer from a critical lack of public infrastructure. Papua New Guinea's challenges are compounded by its difficult geography. Thick jungle, wide rivers and rugged mountains make roads expensive to build and maintain. Consequently, even many large regional towns do not have road access to the capital, Port Moresby. This makes the delivery of other public services even more challenging. In particular, the provision of health care to the estimated 80 to 85 per cent of residents who live in traditional rural communities is patchy and at times non-existent. As a result, health outcomes in Papua New Guinea are poor by regional standards. Life expectancy is shorter and infant mortality is higher than in most neighbouring Pacific countries. The prevalence of deadly preventable diseases such HIV-AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria remains a concern.

At government level, the Australian government provides around $500 million per annum in official development assistance to PNG, making Papua New Guinea the largest recipient of Australian foreign aid. But government aid only tells part of the story. There are also committed Australian NGOs and volunteers who are determined to make a positive difference to the health of Papua New Guineans who live in rural and remote areas. One of the most successful of these groups is Youth With a Mission Medical Ships Australia—also known by their acronym, YWAM MSA. YWAM MSA are a great example of what can happen when a group of dedicated and determined people join forces to work for the common good.

Since their founding in 2010, YWAM MSA have been providing primary health services from their base in Townsville to remote, isolated coastal communities in Papua New Guinea's Western Province. In the absence of any road or air links, they do this in unique fashion, via their custom-modified medical ship. Recently, YWAM MSA were able to fundraise for the purchase of a new, larger ship to replace their previous vessel, which was 35 years old. The new ship, the MV YWAM PNG, was launched in April this year and commissioned by the Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, the Hon. Peter O'Neill. It is a catamaran vessel that was converted from a cruise ship for the purposes of providing a fully self-sufficient floating medical facility. The ship can accommodate up to 100 volunteers—twice the capacity of the previous ship—and will eventually accommodate a dentistry clinic, operating theatre, laboratory and infrastructure to carry up to four small boats that can be launched to reach extremely remote communities.

This ship plays a vital role in the delivery of health services to communities in the Western Province. Without YWAM MSA, many of these communities would lack any form of medical coverage at all. YWAM MSA ships are crewed entirely by volunteers. Medical and other professionals give freely and generously of their time to work onboard the vessel. Services are provided with the support of the PNG National Department of Health, which signed a memorandum of understanding with YWAM MSA in 2011. In addition to providing medical treatment, YWAM MSA volunteers do important work in the communities they serve by providing education on basic health and first aid so that locals have the skills and knowledge to deal with medical emergencies.

In just a few short years of operation, YWAM MSA have managed to raise substantial funding from an impressive array of corporate and NGO partners. To assist with fundraising efforts, the coalition government, through the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Minister Julie Bishop, has committed $2 million over four years towards YWAM MSA operations in the Gulf and Western provinces. The foreign minister travelled to Townsville in early April to make the announcement alongside the member for Herbert.

YWAM MSA is a great example of what can be achieved with goodwill, hard work, persistence and a great cause to rally around. The House congratulates all YWAM MSA volunteers for their ongoing efforts to improve the lives of people living in remote communities in Papua New Guinea. I acknowledge the work of the member for Leichhardt and his wife in their support, and I commend the motion to the House.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and reserve my right to speak.

Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I congratulate the member for Leichhardt on introducing the Marriage Legislation Amendment Bill 2015. He will certainly be on the right side of history. I also want to acknowledge his support for the people of Papua New Guinea over many, many years.

Papua New Guinea has some of the lowest living standards and worst health outcomes in our region. The World Health Organization estimates that life expectancy for the people of Papua New Guinea is 62 years for men and 65 years for women. In 2005, 14,000 of the total of 15,000 child deaths that occurred in the Pacific region were in Papua New Guinea. Given these figures, it is no surprise that Papua New Guinea's health status is one of the worst of any nation throughout our region or the world.

For a population of more than seven million people, Papua New Guinea has fewer than 400 doctors, and only 51 of them work outside the capital, Port Moresby. It is a country that is really ruled by its geography and, as such, isolation continues to be a real barrier to proper treatment. This is something that the former Rudd and Gillard governments understood. We targeted our health and overseas development aid budget for Papua New Guinea to deal with some of these issues.

In July 2013 I was fortunate, as the Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island Affairs, to go to Papua New Guinea, to Daru in the Western Province—one of the most remote regions—to open the tuberculosis clinic that was funded by the Australian government. That was a $33 million investment in a 22-bed TB isolation ward and ablutions clinic. It is housed at the Daru General Hospital.

As part of that $33 million commitment we also funded a sea ambulance. The role of the ambulance was to travel up and down the Fly River to some of the most remote villages of Papua New Guinea and bring people who were suspected of tuberculosis contagion back to the clinic which the Labor government had funded at the hospital. By all accounts, that service is still running and still doing an excellent job in fighting what is a very big problem within Papua New Guinea, particularly in the western region—tuberculosis.

This was a partnership. It was a joint effort by the Australian government, the Papua New Guinean government and also the Ok Tedi Fly River Development Program. It is pleasing to see that that program has got results. In the first year—in one year alone—it reduced the mortality rate from drug-resistant tuberculosis from 25 per cent to just five per cent. The program has the support of the United Nations and other NGOs that have been working in that region fighting tuberculosis for many years. This was a great example of a Labor government understanding the challenge of remoteness, of the inaccessibility of proper health care for many people in the regions of Papua New Guinea, and working with the Papua New Guinean government and other organisations to combat it. The results speak for themselves.

In that light, it is pleasing to see that the Abbott government is supporting similar initiatives. The YWAM initiative is in that vein, providing medical services through sea ambulances and other vessels to remote regions of Papua New Guinea, albeit at a reduced rate of support. Unfortunately, the Abbott government has moved some of the focus of our overseas development aid away from poverty reduction and sustainable development. That is a key outcome that has been taken out of Australia's overseas development aid program. Unfortunately, I think you are not going to see the level of support that is necessary, particularly in the Pacific, for programs such as this, which reduce preventable diseases in remote regions throughout the Pacific. The $11.3 billion cut the Abbott government made when it comes to overseas development aid will have an effect, unfortunately, on programs such as the one I mentioned a moment ago.

I have been speaking quite closely with a number of NGOs and overseas development aid organisations who are uncertain about whether or not many of the programs that they run in places like Papua New Guinea will continue into the future. I congratulate Mrs Prentice for moving this motion. If there is one thing that comes out of this it is that the Abbott government needs to explain to the NGOs and organisations that do this great throughout the Pacific whether or not their funding will be continuing and whether or not they can continue to run these programs.

Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I also would like to commend the member for Ryan for putting this forward as a motion. With regard to the previous speaker, I am a little bit disappointed at the criticism that he is targeting at our government in relation to the support that we offer for Papua New Guinea. I was in the Western Province only the week before last where I was involved in opening a ranger program that was funded by this government. It would never have happened if it had not been for this government providing that funding. It is making the first steps ever to provide service through the aid programs in those remote treaty villages—something that has never existed in the past. Money was spent but it was certainly not reaching the areas where it was targeted.

With regard to YWAM, a lot has been said about the history of this wonderful organisation, so I am not going to go back into that history. What I would say is that, when you start looking at the statistics, delivering basic services into Papua New Guinea poses very serious challenges, with 80 per cent of the population living in very remote areas without connectivity by road et cetera. It is a nation where 43 per cent of the population is under the age of 15. There is a good reason for that: one in four Papua New Guinean children will not survive to celebrate their 40th birthday. This is where YWAM comes in and does a fabulous job.

I am just going to give you some statistics from the 2014 annual report from YWAM. This is the sort of outcome that has been done with a very small amount of investment. There was a couple of million dollars invested recently, and I appreciate the $2 million investment that went into the organisation's work through the foreign affairs minister. In 2014, YWAM Medical Ships, this one small group who are all volunteers, saw 9,109 primary healthcare patients in 2014. There were 9,833 immunisations given. There were 2,960 dentistry procedures. There were 2,810 optometry clinic patients. There were 109 ophthalmology procedures. There were over 36,167 professional attendees at health promotion sessions and there were also 19,822 preventive health resources distributed.

It is all very well to give out tablets and pills and the likes of that, but more importantly you have got to deal with the core problems. Of course, a lot of that has to do with the poverty and the way in which these people live and the need for clean water, sanitation et cetera. So in 2014 they also held water safe training. There were 240 communities that were trained through the YWAM procedures. There was basic electricity and generator training for 33 communities. On the coastal communities they use only outboard motors et cetera. There were another 42 training sessions for that, and there were 44 sessions in the communities for safe water projects. These are very important. They are the things that help these communities start to manage for themselves.

The member for Ryan mentioned my wonderful wife, Yolonde. In February last year Yolonde was appointed the Cairns community ambassador for YWAM Medical Ships Australia, and she is the first community ambassador that has ever been appointed. Her role is to raise community awareness, recruit volunteers and help strengthen sister city relationships. The new ship, MV YWAM PNG, left Cairns in April 2015 on its maiden voyage, and my wife, Yolonde, joined the ship in Port Moresby for her first volunteer tour. There were 80 other volunteers on board, including the crew, and they did 4.5 clinical days. A lot of that work was done in the Central Province area. Just in that short time they visited 10 villages in two provinces where they saw 706 primary healthcare patients. They gave 494 immunisations, gave 81 health promotion sessions, saw 58 dental patients and saw 447 optometry patients. The sad part about it was that there was a young girl there with HIV and tuberculosis who she saw on her first day. She looked to be about five or six years old and in a dreadful condition, but they were able to give her some treatment. This is the fabulous work that this wonderful organisation does, and I cannot commend it enough. I certainly encourage ongoing support from both sides of the parliament.

Debate adjourned