Page 2192 - Week 07 - Thursday, 6 June 1991
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problems in spite of the repeated requests from the then interim board. The people of Canberra have spent a lot of money for a report which should not have been necessary, Mr Speaker.
There is no doubt that the feelings of the community toward this Government are shame and that there is no confidence in this Government. Mr Speaker, their time has run out.
MR CONNOLLY (3.49): Mr Speaker, I am surprised that no member of the Government back bench or their remaining frontbencher is prepared to get up and defend the Chief Minister. Perhaps, on reflection, I should not be so surprised.
The most staggering remark made in this chamber so far today - a remark which is the hallmark of this arrogant Government and which should be of concern to any person in this chamber who is minded to support this Government in the belief that they may be changing their spots on schools and hospitals and that we may be seeing a warmer, cosier, fuzzier Liberal Government - was the statement by the Chief Minister where he was attacking Labor on what he called decibel democracy; attacking Labor because Labor listens; attacking Labor for listening to the community views. Decibel democracy, says the Chief Minister. Any member of this chamber who is not a member of the government parties and who is thinking that this Government is going to change its tune should contemplate those words of the Chief Minister. It is decibel democracy, he says, when you go out and listen to community views.
That is typical of the arrogance of this Government and, dare I say it, typical of the arrogance of this Chief Minister, reflected, we read in the Canberra Times - we often find useful information in the Canberra Times - in the views of members of the executive of his own party last weekend, as they were reported. It is this arrogant style of this Liberal Government that the community of Canberra is rejecting, and that style is shown most clearly by that throwaway line, "decibel democracy", when we say that you should be listening to the community.
Mr Speaker, in the farrago of farce and failure that has marked this Liberal led Alliance Government over the past 18 months no single issue better exemplifies that Government's failure to properly administer this Territory than their announcement recently, in a bizarre fashion, of a total reversal of the longstanding commitment in Canberra to the leasehold system as the basis of planning and land management and the basic concept of a premium to be paid for renewal of commercial leases. Certainly, Mr Speaker, the dismemberment of the public health system and the assault on public education by this Government were appalling. My colleagues Mr Wood and Mr Berry today have
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