Page 3437 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 19 September 1990
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Mr Jensen: You have to say you are going to support it; otherwise Wayne will say you are not going to support it.
MR STEFANIAK: Well, I think we are all supporting it over here, are we not, Norm? I will be interested to see the result of the deliberations of the Administration and Procedures Committee.
MR STEVENSON (11.40): If ever there was a requirement for honesty and integrity in representative government it is certainly in the ACT. Unfortunately there is an appalling history of those qualities. Firstly, if we go back to the original platform of the Abolish Self Government Coalition we see that it advocates following the Constitution, which makes it unconstitutional for the Federal Government to force Canberrans into looking after the nation's capital. Secondly, we can look at the 1978 referendum which showed that 70 per cent of people in the ACT did not want self-government.
Both these things, unfortunately, were ignored by the Federal Labor Government and, indeed, the Liberal members as well. But the ACT Assembly had an opportunity to put the matter right or at least inquire into the matter; for, on 4 July 1989, I moved a motion that would have required the constitutional legality of this Assembly to be looked at. Unfortunately for the Constitution and the people of Canberra, that motion was defeated by 16 votes to one.
Where does support for honesty, integrity and representative government come in such a defeat, in terms of representing the will of the people? It is well known where my coalition stands on this. I fight long and hard - and will continue to do so - to see that the will of the people and the constitutional law are followed. But let us look at some of the examples in this Assembly. One is the X-rated video issue. Every State in Australia has banned X-rated videos and yet we in Canberra - and specifically the Labor Party - allow the promotion and distribution of X-rated videos from the ACT throughout Australia, notwithstanding that that is subversive of every State's law.
The majority of people in Canberra - 60 per cent - do not want X-rated videos going from this town to other States. Indeed, the larger percentage - approximately 50 per cent - do not want X-rated videos in Canberra. They want them banned. Some 40 per cent would allow them. During the campaign the Labor Party accepted some $8,000 from the porn pushers called the Adult Video Industry Association. Unfortunately that money was not declared. There was no action taken by the Electoral Commission. But it is one thing to take the money - and one could say that is perfectly acceptable if you wish to do that; I certainly would not - but it is another entirely different matter to not declare the - - -
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