Page 6035 - Week 18 - Thursday, 12 December 1991
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MS FOLLETT (Chief Minister and Treasurer) (3.32): It really is yet another occasion, Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, when Dr Kinloch would have done far better to maintain his very admirable Quaker tradition of silent contemplation. He has certainly done himself no good whatsoever in his vapid blatherings on this so-called matter of public importance.
I am intrigued, for a start, that a representative of the Residents Rally who has in fact been in coalition with the Liberal Party - in fact, by a signed agreement, the accord - has now brought it upon himself to declare that the Labor Party is now in coalition with the Liberal Party. We are not. I find it absolutely ludicrous that Dr Kinloch, who signed that accord, should now be referring to some other coalition when, in fact, it was the Rally who were in just such a coalition.
But what it does mostly speak of is the Rally's total and absolute lack of any sort of policy direction. They are quite unable to appreciate that both the Labor Party and the Liberal Party do have policies and platforms, and they stick to them. Of course, the Rally have never been able to do that. Whether the Rally have been in government, in opposition or on the crossbenches, or wherever they have been, they have been absolutely incapable of sticking to any of their undertakings that were given when they stood for election, and in that respect they are every bit as reprehensible as the Abolish Self Government people, the No Self Government people and everybody else who has walked away from their election platform.
In fact, the Rally, I think, has a lot more to answer for because they maintain this farce that they do have policies. They maintain that they have the high moral ground. They do not, and, as a party, they have been shown over and over again to be utter frauds. In Dr Kinloch's highly politicised statement today, which was dressed up again as the high moral ground, we have seen, yet again, the Rally's bankruptcy in terms of any kind of policy and any kinds of convictions.
Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, as Mr Kaine said, I think Dr Kinloch must have had his ears firmly stopped up if he has failed, over the past years, to observe the actions taken for the economic well-being of the ACT. I would like, yet again, to repeat very briefly, for Dr Kinloch's benefit, what those actions taken by the Labor Government have been. The ACT, in this year, was faced with an enormous cut in Commonwealth funding. Dr Kinloch does not have to worry about that; he is never going to be in government again. He probably will not ever be in the Assembly again. He most certainly will never be responsible for the economic well-being of the Territory. So, that fact of the Commonwealth cut of nearly 20 per cent has passed him by. It is a mere detail to Dr Kinloch; it is not of any interest.
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