Page 2856 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 15 August 1990
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MR SPEAKER: Order! Thank you. I will explain, to clarify that issue. The Clerk has asked for the advice, not through the Attorney-General.
MR MOORE: That certainly was my misunderstanding which I am now quite happy to withdraw. The legal advice from Mr Collaery's department went through the Clerk to you, Mr Speaker. I remind Mr Collaery and you, Mr Speaker, that when he was in the same situation, sitting in opposition, and he objected to the way the debate was carried out in terms of the election of the Leader of the Opposition he went to you and said that it was entirely inadequate legal advice that came from the department and that he wanted independent legal advice.
It is not that he considered the officers providing the advice illegal - I have no objection to the officers who I consider are quite competent - but Mr Collaery was unhappy that that was not independent legal advice. Why else would he have gone to you and sought independent legal advice? This is a matter that is even more serious than what Mr Collaery has spoken about.
So what we have here is hypocrisy from Mr Collaery who now stands up and says, "We cannot have independent legal advice". The reason for it is quite straightforward - he does not want members of his Government to stand up - - -
Mr Kaine: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: Mr Moore is attributing to the Attorney-General comments that he has not made.
Mr Berry: That is not a point of order.
MR SPEAKER: Thank you. That is not - - -
Mr Kaine: It is a point of order. He is being misrepresented.
MR MOORE: The point that I am making, Mr Speaker, is that Mr Collaery is a hypocrite because he went to you on that matter and said that he needed independent legal advice on such a matter. It should have been independent legal advice on this matter as well. Instead, we closed the debate on the Ainslie Transfer Station, the Royal Canberra Hospital and schools, which are all of primary interest to the people of Canberra, because he does not want members of his Government to stand up and be counted. He knows that the people who keep saying to everybody, "I am against school closures", as Hector Kinloch keeps telling everybody - and he tells them that Carmel Maher is against school closures - do not want to be counted because they do not have the guts to cross the floor.
They have the power to stop school closures. They have the power to put a motion if they feel strongly enough about it. We have a Bill here. It is quite clear about school closures that they do not want to be counted because they
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