Page 1044 - Week 06 - Thursday, 27 July 1989
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
Reid, but we will burden the Commonwealth with our unemployed. What this Government is about is delivering jobs for the people of the ACT. That is progress.
MR HUMPHRIES (11.23) in reply: I welcome the announcement from the Deputy Chief Minister this morning that the Government has accepted in broad terms the recommendations of this report, and I welcome in particular the news that there will be some announcement by the Government towards the end of next month as to, in particular, the question of how the community facilities which the report identifies as being so important to this whole proposal are to be structured and presumably funded. I emphasise the point in the report that we see those facilities as being extremely important and their delivery as being essential to the proposal, that the shortfall question is a serious one, and that we hope the Government can address constructively and imaginatively the way in which that might be overcome.
I want to just briefly correct some misquoting of me that occurred in the Canberra Times this morning. I was quoted as saying that there would be a $10m shortfall. I did not say that. I said that the shortfall could be in excess of $10m.
I want to pick up a few points that have been made in the course of this debate by members of the Residents Rally. The impression was created in one remark that the Canberra casino might bear some of the hallmarks of what we might call Las Vegas style casinos, neon signs, with dancing girls, flashing lights and the sort of thing we associate with the worst of American casinos. I sincerely hope that that is never a feature of any casino in this city, and I hope that that kind of image of a casino is not the one that the Government has in mind. We have a certain style in this city and I see no reason why the casino could not fit in with that style. The Las Vegas model is not one we would use for this city, I hope.
The Residents Rally made references to the will of the community - Mr Moore used that phrase. Dr Kinloch referred to the voice of the people, the need for us to know what people think on this issue, and referred to the votes of the respective parties during the recent election. I want to remind the Residents Rally that in the course of that last campaign a separate campaign was conducted by people, including the Committee for a Casino-Free Canberra, against those parties that supported a casino. They published large ads in the Canberra Times saying, "Do not vote for these parties. Voting for these parties is a vote for the casino". They said that they identified the particular candidates and they identified the parties.
The fact is that in this Assembly, duly elected, are at least nine members elected on a platform of supporting a casino for Canberra, and sitting in this chamber are only four members elected expressly on the platform of opposing a casino for Canberra.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .