Page 2454 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 6 August 1991
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It is all very well to say how terribly opposed one is to the idea of people coming and selling arms. It seems to me that the people who buy the arms are equally at fault if there is any moral repugnance attaching to this transaction. What representations has Mr Connolly made about the Australian Government not buying the arms which are exhibited at fairs such as this?
We know, of course, that the arms bazaars are not going to discontinue. While ever governments buy arms - and there is no suggestion by Mr Connolly, Dr Kinloch or Mr Duby that the Australian Government should stop buying arms - there will have to be venues where they can look at what they propose to buy. And, whether that happens here in the city of Canberra or in Wollongong, Sydney, Adelaide, or wherever it might be, it will go on.
What possible benefit has there been to the Government of the Australian Capital Territory in banning this exhibition from the ACT when it will simply move - as it certainly will move - to somewhere else in this country and some other city or community will get the benefit of the trade which is generated by its location there? Even worse, if it goes overseas, Australian manufacturers of arms - of course, there is a very large Australian industry in this area - will lose the benefit of having their wares viewed at home by the Australian Government. The facts just do not stack up, and I think those opposite ought to think about the implications of banning this exhibition of this trade at this time.
There are more issues than simply the revenue to the ACT Government. There are many more important issues than just that. There are many other people who gain major benefit, in a business sense, from the holding of this exhibition in this city. For example, there are the people who supply the exhibition with materiel and infrastructure - conference organisers, caterers, cleaners, people who actually make the thing happen. They all miss out. The people who get their double overtime, or whatever it might be, at the exhibition centre do so because the exhibition is there, not because they happen to be working at that place. The accommodation and hospitality industry stands to lose a great deal of money. No-one can be quite certain of how much. Mr Connolly certainly has not tried to find out just how much. A great deal of money results from the fact that there is an exhibition of this kind in town, to which people from all over the world come to exhibit. Transport misses out - taxis, hire cars, the airlines.
And, of course, there is the question of government revenue. I have to ask, of course, why it is that the Government charges so little and has to expend so much on exhibitions of this kind. It seems to me that, if indeed the figures cited by Mr Connolly are accurate, clearly the ACT Government in the past has been investing in the ACT community's business and economy by having conferences such
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