Page 1682 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 29 May 1990
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position because of a conviction that she had. They can see the disparity in the performance of the people opposite. That is why it is extremely important that the entire Government bench opposite be open to public scrutiny in terms of a debate about the censure of one of its Ministers.
MR HUMPHRIES (Minister for Health, Education and the Arts) (4.34): Mr Speaker, there is no question that the issue that Mr Berry has been trying, forlornly, throughout today to raise should be debated at some appropriate point in the course of the business of this Assembly. No-one has argued that should not be the case but - - -
Ms Follett: You have just voted against it three times.
MR HUMPHRIES: I have voted against its being debated right now, Ms Follett. I do not believe this is an important time to be debating that issue. Now, you say that other responsible governments would not have stood in the way of debates on such issues at such points in time. I ask you to consider what would happen if someone jumped up in the House of Representatives as the Treasurer was about to deliver his budget statement for the year and said, "I want to move a motion of censure on Mr So and So, or Miss Such and Such".
Of course that would not be tolerated, nor should anybody tolerate an interruption to the Chief Minister's tabling of and response to this very important document, the report of the Priorities Review Board. The document has been long and anxiously awaited by members of this Territory and I think that it is an appropriate document to give some latitude to. That is exactly what we have done.
The statement I am about to deliver, for which leave is being denied by those opposite, follows on from the Chief Minister's statement and outlines the decisions the Government has made in respect of the plans for the redevelopment of the public hospital system and the corporatisation of the Mitchell Health Services Supply Centre. They go hand in hand with that and they ought not be interrupted by the trivia that those opposite seek to bring forward.
I say "trivia" advisedly, because this issue of such burning importance, of such magnitude, of such enormity to the future of the Territory has lain before this Assembly since 9 April. Mr Duby's conviction was recorded in the magistrates court on 9 April. There have been at least two sitting weeks since that time. If this is such a vitally important issue, why has the Opposition not seen fit to raise it before? Why has it waited until the day on which the Priorities Review Board report has come down to raise an issue of such so-called importance? The simple fact is that Opposition members want to grandstand. They want to grab a few of the headlines that will probably go to the Chief Minister in respect of that report. That is the
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