Page 4044 - Week 14 - Wednesday, 24 October 1990
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It is signed by Cafe Noshes, Mr Yeeros, Canberra Tobacco & Gift Store, Olympic Travel Agency, Christis Hair Salon, Civic Chicken Gourmet, Develin's Pharmacy, Alaa Dean Lebanese Restaurant, Mama's Trattoria, Pierre Glasson, Mopokes Restaurant, Esquire Restaurant, Garema Health Foods, Neil Grano, Garema Terrace Coffee Lounge, Joseph Menswear, Pizzaria, City Camera House, Attila Studios, Gus' Coffee Lounge, Canlab, Africasia Gifts, Happy's Chinese Restaurant - - -
Mr Kaine: Do you want the telephone directory, Bill?
MR STEFANIAK: Trevor, it goes on forever. It is a long one. It is also signed by AM PM Cellars, Hansen's Jewellers, Sorrento Pizza Bar, Bon Marche Deli, MacKinley Optical, Music Room, Angus and Robertson, Gilbert's Bookshop and Ali Baba.
Mr Berry: And how many said no?
MR STEFANIAK: No-one said no, Mr Berry.
Mr Berry: How many refused to sign?
MR STEFANIAK: You might like to count them, Wayne. I think you will find that there are not too many other shops. If you look back to last year's debate you will see that 100 per cent of shopkeepers in Weston Creek, 100 per cent of shopkeepers in Rivett and 95 per cent of shopkeepers in Garema Place - the other 5 per cent could not be contacted - were in support of this power. It is something for which the shopkeepers, the small business people of Canberra, have been clamouring for some time.
Mr Speaker, this power is no big deal. It is basic commonsense. I am disgusted at the Labor Party's continued paranoia and opposition to it, as I think a lot of the old-style Labor people also would be. John Curtin and Ben Chifley would probably turn in their graves if they could see their latter-day colleagues opposing a commonsense, practical power such as this, which protects the ordinary men and women of Canberra, the people whom the Labor Party purports to protect.
The power especially protects the old, the infirm and women from being intimidated. It is a commonsense power. It is socially beneficial, in that even the people who might tend to prey on the weaker members of our society, perhaps through their inexperience or the fact that they have had too much to drink, have a chance to avoid arrest for more substantive offences because it gives them the chance to move on before anything too serious occurs. Mr Speaker, we are opposing it. I hope that a couple of members opposite might see sense and oppose this motion by the Labor Party.
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