Page 2033 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 25 October 1989
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There are two matters of significance in that response. The first is that the Legislative Counsel's Office has decided of its volition on an interpretation of the law and has decided not to draft the amendment so Mr Stevenson can try it on in this chamber and open it for debate. That is a very significant decision of the Legislative Counsel's Office and it is not one that the Rally supports.
The second is the substantive decision itself in relation to the judgment made that what Mr Stevenson proposes is to substitute his staff for consultants. That may be an issue of fact, it may be an issue that goes to the allegations that the Deputy Chief Minister and perhaps others have made, that this is a tax rort, but that is not the issue that concerns the Residents Rally. What concerns the Residents Rally is that this proposed law precludes opposition members from employing consultants. That is an unnecessary hindrance. It hampers the operations of the members and therefore, by equal extension, it hampers the attention that the members can give to their duties in the Australian Capital Territory.
Given that consultants are employed so widely, given that the Chief Minister employed Concrete Constructions' consultant to present her draft budget, given the precedents in that respect, is it not appropriate for members to be able to employ consultants without the irrelevant smokescreen attaching to this Government's perception of Mr Stevenson and what he may or may not be about?
An important issue devolving upon the Assembly is whether Assembly members can adequately perform their duties and whether in this day and age consultants should not be properly employed. Coming from the business sector myself, I utterly refute the insults that this Deputy Chief Minister made to the consultants industry. These gross insults will be known to the consultants industry within hours, I have no doubt, and the suggestion that arrangements that they make and the way they structure their firms are forms of tax avoidance will surely put this Minister in his place. He likes to be everyman to the business community, but at heart he is another one of those people climbing out of prejudice and the oppressions of another view of business - a successful or unsuccessful one we wait to know about.
We know that this Deputy Chief Minister has a jaundiced attitude to business, and he has shown it again in his attitude to consultants. His own experiences may have influenced that approach. They should not be applied to Mr Stevenson and others. We have a new independent in the Assembly now, Michael Moore. I wonder whether your tune will change, Deputy Chief Minister, when you realise he too may want to employ a consultant. I do not know whether he ever will, but would your tune change or are you going to allege that he has a secret agenda, too? Are you going to judge the issue by the man or according to the principle?
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