Page 4144 - Week 14 - Wednesday, 23 October 1991
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MR KAINE: It is all interesting material. But what has it contributed to the effective operation of this place? Absolutely nothing. The subject that we are talking about, Mr Speaker, is the availability of resources. Mr Collaery says that he has not got enough. Mr Stevenson says that he has not got enough. Dr Kinloch says that he has not got enough. I say that I have not got enough; I could use more resources. Every one of us could use more resources. It is a purely relative thing. What Mr Collaery is saying is that he has less than me; therefore, he should take some of mine. That is not the solution to the problem. That is not the solution to Mr Collaery's problem. If he has not enough resources, he should argue for more, not attempt to take them away from somebody else.
The place to do that is not on the floor of this house. We could have sat around in the conference room on the fifth floor, out of session, and argued the point with the Government and with the Speaker about how much money is available for staff resources and whether there is a better way of allocating that. But, no, we waste over an hour of our private members' time.
Mr Jensen: Why didn't you organise it? You are the so-called Leader of the Opposition with all that extra staff. God! You could not lead a horse to water.
MR KAINE: Now I hear Mr Jensen.
MR SPEAKER: Order!
MR KAINE: Mr Stevenson said that he had not had an opportunity to discuss this matter with any Leader of the Opposition. He is probably right. But then Mr Stevenson has never walked into my office as Leader of the Opposition and asked to talk about it, and neither has Mr Jensen. Never has Mr Collaery or Mr Jensen in the last three months walked into my office and said, "I want you, as Leader of the Opposition, to represent my case on this issue". They have not been in my office; not one of them.
Mr Jensen: Because we know that we would be shown the door.
Mr Stevenson: There has been more than one time that I have asked the Liberal Party to represent certain things - not with a great deal of success, I might add.
MR SPEAKER: Order, Mr Stevenson!
MR KAINE: Mr Jensen, you know that that is not true. If you had come to me and asked me to represent you as Leader of the Opposition, I would have done so. That is my job. I understand my responsibilities and I accept them. But you and the Rally want to have your cake and you want to eat it. You want to sit on the crossbenches. You asserted
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