Page 4010 - Week 14 - Wednesday, 24 October 1990
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
Mr Speaker, let us deal with some of the hypocrisy that we have seen in the last few months. I am delighted to be on my feet at last. Part of Labor gamesmanship is to run debates to the bell so that we cannot get to our feet. That was the experience watched by Weetangera parents who were present in the chamber for the last debate. We watched the whole school debate fall out the window because of a petty and very tragic point-scoring exercise on the Mandela issue. I am pleased that Bill Wood finally got to speak, and he was given extra time by the Government to complete his speech.
In this chamber the Labor Party members have said - and parents have been here to hear it - that they will reopen every school and that it is their policy. Mr Speaker, I challenge the Labor Party members to prove that that is their conference policy. I want them to say which is their policy at the moment - this one from the agreed policy which has gone through the branches and been approved by the administration committee, or is there a new policy? If there is a new policy, where was that developed and is it in concrete?
I expect one of the speakers to stand up and provide us with a signed, certified or evidenced policy that any school that is closed, including those that were closed in 1988, will be reopened. I want to hear from the Labor Party what its commitment is to reopen the Page school. I think we are entitled to that, and we are entitled to have this debate out once and for all. The Labor Party members have made a great point-scoring exercise of this budget problem of the ACT. It has been tremendous and luxurious for them to sit out there, holier-than-thou, and thump us for what their good friend and factional leader, Ros Kelly, did only two years ago. Was it not great?
We see Mr Moore posturing, too. He supported the Residents Rally policy, which was the same as the Labor Party's policy, on school closures; yet he has disavowed that. He alone, with his vast and newly burgeoning economic expertise, is going to solve the whole problem. He is going to sack policemen to keep schools open. It is very simple - you just shift bodies around. He is going to knock $10m or $20m off the police vote, just like that. Presumably he would assist the Government to deal with the Australian Federal Police Association and all the women and children who would be affected when Mr Moore effectively talks down our case - that is the tragedy, Mr Speaker - that is before the Commonwealth Grants Commission at the moment.
There is no more horrendous sabotage happening at the moment than the sorts of actions in which Mr Moore is engaging, talking down our arguments to the Commonwealth for extra funding in a number of areas. You cannot isolate Mr Moore's arguments from those relating to the schools. The very clear fact is that Mr Moore has this micro approach to economics. He believes that you can shift
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .