Page 1529 - Week 05 - Thursday, 18 April 1991
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changes to road and traffic arrangements which have been occurring recently. I know that the Labor Party offices have been flooded with questions from residents over why, in their view, money is being wasted on many of those projects.
Mr Speaker, Mr Kaine also reannounced his deputy's decision to establish a referral or counselling service for businesses in financial difficulty. As I stated here on 19 March, I believe that, while this proposal deserves support, it is simply treating the symptoms and not the causes. I believe that the proposal will have no effect on the ACT's economic climate and that what we need in the ACT is positive action. There has been no action from this Government, for instance, on commercial tenancies - a measure which is desperately needed to protect businesses from unjustifiable rent imposts.
The Government is not taking positive action to deal with the current economic downturn. Even where there is some sign of action, the Government's pace is far too slow to be of use in boosting the ACT's economy in difficult times. We have only to look at two examples. One, of course, is the section 19 decision announced yesterday by Mr Kaine. The result of Mr Kaine's inability to deliver on that project, brought about through sheer ineptitude and by a divided government, is that 1,000 jobs in the ACT will simply not be created. The tourism industry, the construction industry and the ACT economy will have to do without the boost that that project would have provided to the ACT. Mr Speaker, I believe that the delay, the incredible delay, in considering section 19 really - - -
Mr Collaery: You set the tender conditions.
MR SPEAKER: Order!
MS FOLLETT: I believe that the incredible delay in considering section 19, together with Mr Collaery's obdurate opposition to that project, has denied the people of the ACT the benefits that that project would have won.
Mr Collaery: I have in no way influenced the tender.
MS FOLLETT: Mr Collaery's repeated and aggressive interjections obviously indicate that he feels that he is guilty. Mr Speaker, also on the question of delay and lack of decision making through sheer ineptitude, we still have the incredible mess of the ACT planning and development legislation. The Government, who made this a major plank of their platform on their dismissal of my Government, have not been able to produce the legislation that is required by the ACT, and they have certainly not been able to produce it in a timely fashion.
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