Page 3009 - Week 10 - Thursday, 16 August 1990
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MR MOORE (4.21): Mr Speaker, there are some great ironies about this move for more ministries at this time. Certainly for the joint party room to go ahead with it and to hear Mr Duby supporting the move is in itself ironic, as we remember that he was elected on a no self-government basis and then said that if he got elected he would be going for lean, mean government. The potential of an extra couple of ministries to be lean and mean is debatable.
On the other hand, one cannot help feeling that there are some indications of need in this way. Certainly the incompetence with which the health and education portfolios have been handled indicates that perhaps Mr Humphries is working too hard. Nobody can deny that he is working too hard. At times when I come here very early in the morning or late at night - not necessarily to sleep but to pick something up - I often note that Mr Humphries' car is here. No doubt he is working hard; I do not debate that. He has two of the most difficult ministries. Perhaps the point is that it is just too much for him. Perhaps that is why he has not been able to see through the snow job that has caused him to want to close down schools and hospitals.
Whilst I am reluctant to support this move in any way, I can see that on that side of things there may be some reasons. Similarly, with each of the portfolios, the way they are handled does make one begin to think that perhaps they are just too much for the people handling them, and one solution is to put more ministries in.
But it will provide us with some practical problems. The first, and probably the most significant one is how we are to increase the size of the front bench. Clearly there just will not be room to put six Ministers across the front bench. I think this is something that we should have been considering because obviously the reason that they were after these ministries was to make sure that everybody got a reasonable share. If everybody is to get a reasonable share and these ministries are to be equal, we have that particular problem. How we resolve that is a practical difficulty.
There are other practical difficulties, and they have to do with things such as travel and travel expenditure. Clearly, while we have four Ministers, they cannot attend everything, so with another couple of Ministers we might get an increase in travel expenditures. I understand that Mr Duby's department spent about $500,000 in the last year on travel and so forth.
Mr Duby: I beg your pardon?
MR MOORE: I understand that Mr Duby's department, in the last year, spent about $500,000 on travel.
A member: I think you left the word "department" out.
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