Page 2000 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 24 October 1989
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MR DUBY: No, but I have "ad nauseamed" on a lot of other committees. I think that stance should be adopted by all people in this Assembly. What is the point of having committees if, when the recommendations are made, we all rush off and say, "We didn't like recommendations 1 through 7; we liked 8, 9 and 10, but 11 through 17 are no good."?
Mr Kaine: Very good point, Craig, I think.
MR DUBY: I am pleased to see that I have at least one supporter on the floor of the house. Naturally, I assume he will be instructing one of his cohorts to refrain from putting amendments to the Bill tomorrow.
Mr Humphries: He won't do it tomorrow.
Mr Stefaniak: No, I won't do it tomorrow. I promise I won't do it tomorrow.
Mr Moore: Or Thursday.
MR DUBY: I did not hear that - or Thursday even. Anyway, this Bill is long overdue. The recommendations by this committee are excellent. They suit the circumstances relating to this Territory, and we will be pleased to see implemented the recommendations of the committee, and those alone.
MR HUMPHRIES (8.56): Mr Speaker, I want to indicate a few concerns about the thrust of this Bill. I believe that, as Mr Stefaniak has indicated, we would do well with this piece of legislation to get it right. He mentioned that this was, I think, the first piece of legislation introduced into this Assembly. Its significance is probably that it was an indication of the Federal Government's commitment to doing something in this field.
Mr Berry: Wrong, Gary.
MR HUMPHRIES: It was certainly one of the accoutrements of the previous Federal Government, to my knowledge, Mr Berry, and as far as I can see that was inherited by this present minority Labor Government. Whether or not it has quite the same concerns, I do not know, but I would be very surprised if your predecessors were not in a similar boat to you today if it were not for the fact that there is now self-government in the ACT, except, of course, that the Federal Government in those days was not responsible to a duly elected assembly.
The arguments which you might have put up and which might be rejected, of course, would not have had to be run past anybody else, because the Federal Government was entirely autonomous, or largely autonomous, on questions of this kind. We have an assembly which is now responsible for considering issues like this, and I believe that, as Mr Stefaniak said, it behoves us to examine them carefully and ensure that we do not make mistakes. I think any observer
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