Page 2859 - Week 10 - Thursday, 15 August 1991
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and the Chief Minister propose to do about share dealings and the rest that come within the definition of "securities" and are swept up into a close nexus with the ASC outside effective remedy for us, given the exclusivity of Federal investigations into these matters.
Just to put that into simple words: Were there to be an investigation like this again, it would again go outside the Territory to be handled and you would rely upon the good graces of those handling it for information. Yet we have the sovereign responsibility for law, order and good government in the Territory, and our courts and our judicial officers are left to run the prosecutions - incidentally, at our cost - whilst we have none of the benefits of the national scheme, except for some set-off payments through the Grants Commission.
There are legal impediments to what we can do to cure the situation. I think we have a most effective credit union and cooperative society situation in the Territory at the moment, but we must learn from what happened when, as the Sydney Morning Herald said, the cream was skimmed off under our noses in this city in recent years. In making these remarks, I am not directing them to any particular personality or person associated with the Canberra Building Society board. I just, again, express my concern that full disclosure, and the full relevance, of many matters was never made during that takeover period, and many shareholders did not know how to make the right decision at the time. Now a significant asset, which blocks Ainslie Avenue, remains in the situation of having been hived off into permanent shareholder ownership.
A shameful chapter in the history of cooperative society dealings closes with this debate today. I doubt that any Labor government would have the courage to revisit the situation, because other issues occurred at the time. The Federal Government quickly moved in at the time of the CBS takeover and passed an ordinance to allow the relevant company to take over those assets down the road from here to which I referred.
In fact, the Companies (Registered Societies) Ordinance was passed specially - and it was published, to my knowledge, on 1 August 1990 - to resolve the legal problems which arose from a conflict between ACT and Federal laws over that issue. It is well known that ACT Government officials tried effectively and forcefully to persuade CBS to accept full disclosure and to attend to the requirements of the then Companies Act. They never did, effectively, but full marks go to the then Chief Minister's Department that did its best to get full disclosure for the community.
What happened then was that the Federal Government lent itself to provide a facility for the creation of a new company, Canberra Centre Holdings, to incorporate it under our legislation, the ACT Co-operative Societies Act, but, with the exception of incorporation, having its activities
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