Page 1107 - Week 06 - Thursday, 27 July 1989
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MR KAINE (Leader of the Opposition) (4.37): Mr Speaker, I will be brief. Clearly this program is something which the standing committee should look at. There are some aspects of the Minister's remarks that cause me some concern, however, because presumably the fact that some of these projects are so urgent that they must go ahead between now and 31 August indicates that there has been removed from the power of the committee the right to make any recommendation about them.
The committee could conceivably even conclude that some of these projects should not go ahead at all. The fact that they are going ahead pre-empts any recommendation that the committee should make. However, I do not think the matter is quite that serious. Even if works were started today on the Theodore Primary School, I just cannot imagine that by 31 August there would be much more there than a hole in the ground, so I am not too concerned about the things that the Chief Minister has said.
There is a need to report by 31 August. I understand the reason why the Minister has set that target, but I would submit that for a great many projects in the program it does not really matter whether they get the nod before the program comes up in September or whether they do not, because as the year goes by some of them probably will not be instituted anyway for many reasons - the lack of labour, the lack of prior planning, all sorts of reasons why a particular project that appears in the program in the event does not take off in the year. I submit, Mr Speaker, that you, as a former serving officer of the air force, well understand why planned projects do not come to fruition necessarily in the year of the program.
The chairman of this committee is not here to speak for himself but, as deputy chairman, I am sure that the committee will take the project that the Chief Minister is giving to us, we will attack it seriously, we will deal with it in a serious way, we will do our best to meet the 31 August timetable and come back with our recommendations as to what the works program really should look like in 1989-90.
MR DUBY (4.39): Mr Speaker, I would just like to point out one fact that seems to have escaped people's notice, the fact that this committee is due to report on 31 August. This house is not sitting on 31 August. It has been brought forward a week. It is actually 24 August now, so what we are really setting up is a committee to look at matters and report in a matter of less than three weeks.
Mr Kaine: We might have to reconvene the house, might we not?
MR JENSEN (4.40): Mr Speaker, I do not wish to take up too much time of the house in relation to this particular matter. I note the comment made by Mr Duby and I also note
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