Page 5454 - Week 17 - Tuesday, 3 December 1991
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pressure has resulted in that oversight. I simply put on the record the fact that we knew that there was some reluctance in the Liberal Party about this proposed committee. It just happened to be a position that was arguable. We put some weight on the Chief Minister's comments in her government direction statement in this house on 21 June 1991. Let me read it into the record. The Chief Minister said, as recorded at page 2286 of Hansard:
My Government will listen to the community and will learn from the community. Some would argue that in government a commitment to consultation and openness are optional extras, icing on the cake as it were, and incompatible with decisive government. This is clearly not the case. Indeed, it is only when a government is fully informed by community views on an issue that it can take decisive and forward thinking action.
The Chief Minister went on to say:
Mr Speaker, no doubt some people will say that my model of open, consultative government is inappropriate in Canberra's current economic circumstances.
We have heard both Mr Kaine and Mr Wood adopt the economic rationalist argument - that here is another expense in the process. But here is an ethic advanced by the Labor Party that is absolutely antithetical and contradictory to what Mr Wood just said, and I criticise the Labor Government for that. I do not attack the Liberal Party for its position. It has been consistent on low levels of bureaucracy even though we did not make substantive inroads into that in government.
Mr Kaine: No, you just employed too many people, Bernard.
MR COLLAERY: Indeed, Mr Kaine interjects. Ms Follett went on in her directions for government - the Government she still leads - on that day. As recorded at page 2288 of Hansard, she said:
We all saw the outcry against some of the Alliance's proposals. The earliest objectives for the planning and land use legislation were set by my Government in 1989. It is fundamental that all sectors of the ACT community be given equal opportunity to have an effective voice in how our city is planned and developed and to ensure that our unique environment is fully protected.
She went on to give further assurance. Eminent professional groups are going to read this Hansard. We will make sure of that. Town planners, architects, engineers and landscape architects have been prominent in recent
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