Page 57 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 23 May 1989
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SOCIAL POLICY - STANDING COMMITTEE
Motion (by Mr Whalan) proposed:
That:
(1) A standing committee on social policy be appointed to examine and report on matters referred to it by the Assembly concerning community and health services, housing, welfare, education and social justice issues.
(2) The committee shall consist of 4 members.
(3) A majority of members constitutes a quorum of the committee.
(4) The committee be provided with necessary staff, facilities and resources.
(5) The foregoing provisions of this resolution, so far as they are inconsistent with the standing orders, have effect notwithstanding anything contained in the standing orders.
MR MOORE (4.23): I feel, Mr Speaker, that these have been railroaded through. None of us have had the time to consider them. They were given to us on the floor of the Assembly, without even the politeness or the courtesy of their having been circulated beforehand. We had to read them while we were concentrating on the important things that the Chief Minister had to say about our financial circumstances and so forth. We have already had two of these committees railroaded through without any discussion on the terms of reference, on how they should run, on any of those factors at all. This bodes very badly for any form of consultative government.
This minority Government that we have will be looking to Rally support in many issues, unless it just wishes to have a Liberal-Labor Government with the Liberal-Labor policies pushed right through for the next three years. Judging by the way it is going - if I can speak for the Rally - we are beginning to feel that the Government has no wish to consult with us at all and to treat us as the real opposition.
With reference to the Standing Committee on Social Policy, since I have not had the opportunity to speak on each of the others, I submit that we ought have the opportunity and the time to have a look at the implications of each of these committees. Here comes another piece of paper that we are supposed to read and on which we are to give a well-balanced and appropriate judgment.
I submit that in fact what we have here is the Labor Party, in a minority government position, railroading and ambushing members of this Assembly. Members of the Assembly who are not members of the Labor Party or pseudo members of the Labor Party ought to object to these so that we at least have a day to consider the significance of each one of these motions.
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