Page 3654 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 16 October 1990
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
year with the ABC. Naturally I do not do much these days, but my first broadcasts were in 1960. During that time I had a good association with Richard Carleton and I certainly respect much that he used to do, but we now turn to the program on 60 Minutes.
This was a superficial, shoddy and loaded treatment of our Assembly. I am not speaking here in any way from any particular side of the house. I believe our entire Assembly was demeaned by that program. First of all, such a program should have been based on balanced evidence. Had I been able to talk with Richard - he certainly made no attempt to have such a talk - I would, at the very least, have expected him to hear the following and report on it. I know of at least one other colleague who did have a brief talk with him and in no way was that reflected in the program.
These are the things that should have been said. The existence of this Assembly was the creation of the Federal Government - we are not to be tainted by association with the Federal Government - and among those who created us was Mrs Kelly who is so quick to dismiss us now as a farce. I suggest that she look within her own heart as to what part she played in the creation of this Assembly. Secondly, the election system was also the creation of the Federal Government. We should not be seen to have guilt by association.
Again there is this attempt to make it look as though somehow or other the d'Hondt system was our fault. As we all know, we are here because, one way or another, we had no choice but to operate under that system. I want to assert too - and this was certainly not asserted in that program - that the 17 of us, 18 including our colleague Paul Whalan, have worked hard, whether in or out of government, from scratch.
I have made an extravagant comparison in the past with other governments starting from scratch and I believe that when the history of this Assembly comes to be written - and I hope I will have some part in that - this Assembly will be properly honoured for what it has done since 11 May 1989. I think what we have done is to breathe reality and life into a form of government imposed upon the people of Canberra without our consent, and none of this did Richard Carleton properly emphasise.
I would want to say here - and again I am not being partisan and am not making judgments - that Rosemary Follett and, in turn, Trevor Kaine have worked hard as Chief Ministers to make their respective governments work. You would not have known that from that program. Eight ministers in all, four and four, in that part of the Assembly which is the executive branch, slogged to make this system work, and all of us, especially committee chairpersons - I give special credit there - have worked hard to listen to evidence, to draw up reports and to
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .