Page 1823 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 1 May 1991
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MR SPEAKER: This is not any other parliament. Please proceed, Mr Berry.
MR BERRY: Mr Collaery's position can be likened to a rumour or a false story. This Attorney-General is the greatest example of double standards that we are ever likely to see in politics in the Australian Capital Territory. The good thing about it is that the community has woken up to him and he is not likely to be back next time, and I think that is a good thing.
What Mr Collaery very carefully avoided telling this Assembly was that on the 17th, when he had worked out that he had been beaten to the punch, he muttered that he had some difficulties with the Bill. I wrote to him asking him to provide me with some examples of what he might find wrong with the Bill, so that we could come to an agreement and fix it up. Of course, the response from Mr Collaery has been predictable. He does not want to fix it up. He does not have any problems. He does not want to fix it up, because it would demonstrate clearly how poorly he has performed as what he describes as the leading law officer or the senior law officer in the Territory. Nobody else describes him that way - nobody with commonsense, anyway.
This piece of legislation is intended, as I have said before, to look after people who are on hard times, and to create a better environment in the Australian Capital Territory in relation to the consumption of intoxicating substances. The Minister obviously does not care about that. He is not prepared to put forward a piece of alternative legislation. He is not prepared to table a draft piece of legislation which might replace that which has been put forward by the Labor Party. He has no courage in that respect. His lack of courage has shown through in relation to all his comments in relation to this Bill.
Mr Humphries' parroting of Mr Collaery's position offers nothing to the debate, because Mr Humphries clearly is as wrong as Mr Collaery. It strikes me that this Minister will do anything, anything at all, including inflicting serious damage on the community, in order to preserve the image that he wants to create for himself. That is the way that he has attacked the debate on this piece of legislation - an entirely gutless approach. There is no thought for the community at all, only his own self-interest. That is a hallmark of the Residents Rally. It is something that we have had to live with, and I expect that we will see some more examples of that as we move closer to the 1992 election.
But this Minister will not get away with it. It will be continually brought to the attention of the community, as will his performance on this piece of legislation. Many community organisations have written to me and said that they support this legislation. I suspect that many have written to the Attorney-General and told him that they
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