Page 2988 - Week 14 - Tuesday, 5 December 1989
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The Residents Rally executive discussed whether a censure motion was the appropriate response. This had to be looked at in the context of the fact that the budget was in the middle of its passage through this Assembly and that we had undertaken, for our part, not to block supply to the minority Government. A suspension of standing orders to move a censure motion which, if carried, might require the resignation of those who had participated in the approaches to the Speaker did not appear to provide a tidy solution to a profound problem and could itself be interpreted as diffidence over the budget, a delaying tactic or an exercise in political cynicism to compel a government to resign.
As a more appropriate measure, we resolved to move a motion of no confidence, come what may. My staff prepared the necessary documentation to move the motion, without any reference to you, Mr Speaker, and certainly without reference, initially, to the Liberal Party, as some have suggested. We then had a rare joint party discussion with the Liberal Party and it was resolved to move the motion.
The Liberal Party, in fact, was not aware of the final text of the motion until it was announced by the Clerk on the floor of the Assembly. I wish to say emphatically, Mr Speaker, that no conversation was had with and no hint of this measure was given to the No Self Government Party leader or to Mr Dennis Stevenson, and it goes without saying that the remaining Labor members of the Assembly were not informed.
Ironically there was no expressed intention in the Rally party room to take the video tax affair and the donation aspect any further. After that vote it was resolved to await the outcome of the Electoral Commission inquiry. So I wish to put an end to speculation, Mr Speaker, that this motion was connived at or moved for motives other than in relation to the quite reprehensible act of the Government in approaching you, Mr Speaker, in the manner that I have described to you.
You do not approach a judge about the funding for his court being subject to a decision that you want to go your way. The parallel is there. Mr Speaker, the office of Speaker is the very symbol of propriety and the careful conduct of parliamentary business. This Assembly cannot work effectively if the Government can threaten supply to extract support from the Speaker. The motion therefore was, in our way, win or lose, a method of expressing our total contempt for the acts which had given rise to it.
I took the view that we and the Liberal Party were rock solid in our views on that matter. We were confident of support in that regard. Mr Speaker, clearly, the motion was also the culmination of a number of issues which showed that this Government is too smitten with the wheeler-dealer mentality to promote the image of this Assembly as a democratic institution.
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