Page 601 - Week 02 - Thursday, 21 February 1991
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Mr Jensen: A frank answer, I think Mr Abraham said.
MR KAINE: A frank answer and an honest one. This morning, at 8.40, the same interviewer asked the Leader of the Opposition a question in connection with that response. The Leader of the Opposition started off by saying:
... I think ... that Mr Kaine ought to guard against appearing to make policy on the run like that.
I was not making policy. I did not even give the appearance of making policy. I simply answered a straight question in a straight manner. I said "intellectual laziness" earlier; you either did not read what I said or you deliberately misinterpreted it, because if you had read it or interpreted it correctly you could not possibly have drawn the conclusion that I was making policy on the run. So, as I said, it is either intellectual laziness that you did not bother to read the question or intellectual dishonesty that you chose to deliberately misinterpret it. Later in her answer she said:
He's gone a little bit further on the news by saying that he thinks it's a fair point or something that he might support ...
I did not say that. I in no way implied that I would support the proposal. I merely said that the Government ought to consider it as some of the comment had been made publicly on the matter. I make the point that in two places in her response the Leader of the Opposition either deliberately misquoted or deliberately misinterpreted what I said. I repeat. It is either intellectual laziness or intellectual dishonesty, and I will leave it to other people to make their own interpretation of that, Mr Speaker.
Ms Follett: Mr Speaker, I ask again that that word be withdrawn.
Mr Kaine: I raised the question of whether it was. I did not make an accusation.
MR SPEAKER: It was a rhetorical question, as I understand it. It was not an accusation.
Pensioners - Deemed Interest on Savings
MR STEVENSON: My question is addressed to the Chief Minister as Treasurer and it concerns the Federal Government action in treating the savings of ACT pensioners as though they were attracting 10 per cent interest regardless of whether they were or not. Is the Chief Minister concerned about this unjustified and unjust impost and grab at pensioners' savings in the ACT?
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