Page 3058 - Week 11 - Tuesday, 10 September 1991
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
accusation of dishonesty. How much worse is it for somebody who levelled that accusation of dishonesty in such an approach just a little over a year ago to then come along with exactly the same approach herself and be party to a similar decision? It is not only a question of dishonesty; in the words of the Chief Minister at the same time, if you look at that Hansard, Mr Deputy Speaker, it is hypocritical. The Canberra community would be disgusted to realise that that is the case, and they are disgusted with the turnaround by the Labor Government.
I can think of only one thing that would possibly make this situation worse, Mr Deputy Speaker, and that is that, should we have single member electorates, without a proportional representation system of government, no doubt the Labor Party would be happy to twist and turn in whatever way they can. They would not be so open to scrutiny and so open to question as would be the case with a proportional representation system of government. Finally, Mr Deputy Speaker, should they think that stable government is all the answer, do not forget that Stalin and Hitler had stable governments.
MR BERRY (Minister for Health and Minister for Sport) (3.52): Mr Moore makes great play of allegations of dishonesty. I want to draw to your attention something which will put to rest for the remainder of this debate the strength of Mr Moore's arguments. He referred to page 2137 of Hansard and a statement in Ms Follett's speech on the Royal Canberra Hospital Bill. The quote he used was this:
This Bill is yet another demonstration of the fact that the Labor Party sticks by the promises it made to the Canberra community at the election last year. We stuck to our promises ...
That is what she said. In fact, we did. As Mr Moore knows, the Labor Party's policy on health services at the Acton site has been adhered to strenuously all the way through. For him to say that there has been some breach of that policy is, to use his own word, dishonest because Labor has consistently stuck to its policies in that respect, and it continues to do so. It is also, may I say it, dishonest for Mr Moore to suggest that the circumstances now are the same as they were in June 1990, because things are altogether different.
The question really arises: Why are we debating this today? We are debating this today because the Residents Rally, the Liberals and the No Self Government people prevented that Bill from being debated in 1990 and the blowtorch on the belly being fired up in respect of Residents Rally members and other members of this Assembly who had supported Labor when it first decided upon keeping Royal Canberra Hospital open on the Acton site in 1989.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .