Page 2421 - Week 11 - Thursday, 2 November 1989
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Minister thinks so because he has quoted from it at some length. I would like to know who conducted it. Presumably some government money must have been spent on it, and I would like to know with whom the money was spent. It is a perfectly legitimate question.
Since the Minister implies that at some future time it will be published, I would like, Mr Speaker, to have a copy of the report. I do not see anything objectionable, anything unusual, anything improper, in those requests.
I would like the Minister to reconsider his refusal to answer my questions in question time. I am quite happy if he undertakes, as he has obviously done on other occasions with Mr Collaery, to take me into his office, open the file and let me look over somebody's shoulder so I can read it. I do not mind doing that. But I would like to know, for example, that such a report does in fact exist. I think it is perfectly reasonable for me to ask it and it is perfectly reasonable, I think, for the Minister to accede to my request instead of blatantly refusing to do so.
Mr Speaker, I started by saying that I believe that question time is being misused by the Government. I really believe that to be true. I would like Ministers to show some goodwill, show some evidence of this open and consultative Government that they keep talking about, but which, when it comes to show and tell time, they refuse to show and tell. I think it is time that they accepted the fact that, like it or not, they are a minority government; like it or not the climate is going to continue to change; sooner or later the opposition is going to be able, once again, to put forward a united front. And when they do I am sure we will see the Government become eminently reasonable again. I would like them to be reasonable all the time and I do not think that that is an unreasonable request.
Ms Follett: You had 55 minutes.
MR KAINE: But you did not answer the questions. That is the point.
AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND ENVIRONMENT COUNCIL
Ministerial Statement and Paper
MS FOLLETT (Chief Minister), by leave: Mr Speaker, I wish to bring to the attention of the Assembly a number of environmental issues of national significance and to inform the Assembly on how this Government is ensuring that the ACT makes its contribution to the national debate on the environment and keeps abreast of national developments and trends.
The ACT Government is now a member of the Australia and New Zealand Environment Council. This council is comprised of
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