Page 4890 - Week 16 - Tuesday, 26 November 1991
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MR STEVENSON: "If we choose". What that means is that Mr Wood thinks that five Labor members in this parliament - leaving aside the fact that it is soon going to be abolished because it is unconstitutional, with the High Court challenge - should be able to dictate what happens, and I use the word "dictate" advisedly. Many politicians in Australia are becoming petty dictators.
It is fascinating that one-third of the people in Canberra whom we have surveyed - it is not extensive yet, but it will be - believe that we live in some sort of dictatorship or tyranny as against some form of democracy. I wonder why the other two-thirds believe that we live in some sort of democracy when Mr Wood says that they do not have to take any notice of what the majority of people in this Assembly want; they do not have to take any notice of what the majority of people in Canberra want; they will do what they like. As we well know, though they will continue to deny it in public, it is an ideological decision on their part to attack certain non-government schools, and it will spread if it is not stopped now.
I suggest that the Assembly has no confidence in the Government, as it is called - the Labor Party - in this matter. As to the terms of reference proposed by Mr Humphries, paragraph (c) states:
the practicability and cost effectiveness of greater co-operative resource sharing between government and non-government schools;
I was absolutely amazed that Mr Wood rejected that one out of hand.
Mr Wood: You want to listen. Unplug your ears.
MR STEVENSON: Did you agree with (c)?
Mr Humphries: He meant the other one. I think he meant (3).
MR STEVENSON: He meant (3)? I take it back, if that is the case. I think that would be an excellent idea. If there is a situation where non-government and government schools can share resources and that is agreed upon by the parties involved, what a wonderful idea that is. Point (3) states:
This Assembly calls upon the ACT Government to suspend proposed cuts to three non-government schools pending the outcome of this inquiry.
That is the one Mr Wood rejects out of hand. Why does he reject that out of hand when the Government, the Labor Party, have already said that they will not take such an action against non-government schools? I have raised in this house before the promises made by Mr Wood and the Labor Party to maintain funding at previous levels, yet now Mr Wood says that that is rejected out of hand.
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