Page 3305 - Week 11 - Thursday, 12 September 1991
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MR STEVENSON: It is not necessarily good to run it over Christmastime; that is all. The availability of people, as we well know, is not good. If there are overtime requirements and so on, that just makes it more expensive. If you are going to have the inquiry, and if you are going to extend the time of that inquiry, I believe that it should go to the end of April. However, what should happen is what Mr Connolly recommended, and I was going to suggest that the same thing could be done. We have the advantage in the Social Policy Committee that we have already looked fairly long and hard at this matter. In a couple of our inquiries we have heard about the problem of alcohol. We fairly readily could pick up the problem.
Mr Jensen: How many of these recommendations have been implemented?
MR STEVENSON: I will get to that in a minute. Four of the original five people on the Social Policy Committee are still on that committee. We do not need to spend much time in revamping a great deal of what we did. Mr Speaker, once again one wonders why one speaks in this Assembly. The Labor Party are taking absolutely no notice whatsoever; the people on the other side of the house are taking precious little notice as well.
Mr Duby: But the guard is fascinated.
MR STEVENSON: That is an interesting point. Which guard is that? One would wonder about some of the statements in this house about political manoeuvring or genuine concern about matters. I am very concerned about the suggestions that members' motives are not genuine.
Mr Duby: Dennis, it is just that you have no-one to caucus with.
MR STEVENSON: That is a good point; but one wonders.
MR SPEAKER: Order, members! Please keep your voices down.
MR STEVENSON: It is hard to know who is talking, with so many people on their feet and so many conversations going on. The absolutely remarkable thing is that standing order 39 states:
When a Member is speaking, no other Member may converse or make any noise or disturbance to interrupt that Member.
I know that that has long been forgotten and I doubt whether, on a quick survey of that, had I not read it out, it would have been known by any single person in this Assembly, perhaps even including the Speaker and the guard, who probably takes a lot more notice, not being able to caucus with anybody, than some of the members.
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