Page 1540 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 27 September 1989
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scaremongering, without the kind of pre-emptive action that this Assembly proposes to take, and I would urge members opposite to reconsider their view on this. They will not find that the Government will push them in a hard line on the issue, except to say, and we are adamant about this, that it is an issue which deserves full and adequate consultation.
Mr Collaery: I claim to have been misrepresented, Mr Deputy Speaker. In the strongest speech we have heard to date from this Chief Minister - a speech about doing nothing - she referred to remarks I had made as "flippant". I draw to the attention of the Assembly and those present that those remarks were prefaced by the remark that I would, like Mr Wood, give a personal anecdote, and that was against the background of the full and comprehensive exposition of this issue by my colleague Mr Moore and my other colleague sitting behind me. I claim to have been misrepresented mostly improperly by the Chief Minister.
MR KAINE (Leader of the Opposition) (3.21): I must say that, personally, Mr Deputy Speaker, I was quite offended by the tone of the Chief Minister's participation in this debate. Her denigration of members of this Assembly, either because they have an opinion about the matter, whether they expressed it or not, or because they do not have an opinion, was, I think, most intemperate and unreasonable. It might have escaped the Chief Minister's notice that we in the Liberal Party have a spokesperson on health matters - Mr Humphries. Mr Humphries put the case very well, and there is nothing that I could say that could - - -
Mr Whalan: He said he was not speaking for the party, because he said you did not have a position.
MR KAINE: I did not say that he was. I said that he expressed the case very well.
Mr Whalan: But you said he was speaking on behalf of the party.
MR KAINE: Do not tell me what I said. Why do you not just shut up and listen for once?
Ms Follett: Mr Deputy Speaker, I draw your attention to the language.
MR KAINE: Yes, well, I objected to the language earlier but I did not interpose. Mr Humphries put the case for continuing fluoride very well, and I happen to agree with it. To be told by the leader of the Government that somehow there is a Liberal Party policy, that we are in opposition to the Government on this matter and that we are moving might instead of right is quite wrong. I object to being told that. I will express my view on this when we vote, and I do not appreciate being abused by the Chief Minister because I choose to listen to the debate and to what other people have to say.
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