Page 60 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 7 April 1992
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The most important issue, I believe, is unemployment. As unemployment approaches 9 per cent and as youth unemployment skyrockets to over 30 per cent, the question is: Are our children going to be able to find jobs and stay in Canberra near their families? There is no reason why my children should have to go interstate to find a job.
Part of the Liberal Party package suggested that pay rates should be set to encourage employers to appoint young people. It is a tragedy and a crime that our young people, with their enthusiasm, talent and energy, are unemployed. Our future, the ACT's future and the prosperity of the people of this Territory are tied to the economy of the private sector. The public sector is of great importance, but to become a dynamic community it is the private sector we must look to. We will not do any deals with anyone which will shift Liberal Party policy, especially concerning the private sector.
I thought about all these things as I drove to work today, through the paddocks and by the shores of the lake where new buildings are being constructed. I thought about the past three years and about the future. How are we to achieve these ends? I felt that the answer was in this Assembly, the way it acts, the way it takes up its responsibilities and pulls together in the yoke of administering government. We have a stark choice - the farcical joke of the past, or a serious, deliberate, dynamic, considered government of the future.
Looking around this house, I see those whom the people of the ACT have elected. We are all well qualified. We are committed. I make no apologies for my traditional views, by the way, or for my conservative bias on these matters as well. Every move we make must be made with considered forethought. We must respect the formalities of this house, even as some of us adjust to the frustration of the public service and other things. We are now on show and the public expect us to act with decorum and dignity, with honour and grace, and intelligence, most of all. Anything less is to show contempt and disrespect to the position we have and the people we ultimately have been elected to serve.
Madam Speaker, the Chief Minister today has spoken about a vision of Canberra. I say that this vision is achievable only if we fulfil a vision of government through our behaviour here, and I appeal to you, all of us here, to prove to the disbelievers that self-government is a better choice, to fulfil the hopes of those who have placed their trust already in self-government that we can deliver better government for Canberra. We can do it.
MSÂ SZUTY (8.09): Madam Speaker, it is with much pleasure that I deliver my inaugural speech as a newly elected, Independent member of the Second ACT Legislative Assembly. During the election campaign I gave an undertaking to the people of Canberra to support Rosemary Follett as Chief Minister. I did so because I have always believed that her principles and philosophy as a member of the Australian Labor Party broadly coincide with my own. Rosemary Follett has said that she looks forward, as I do, to rational, intelligent and informed decisions emanating from this, the Second ACT Legislative Assembly. This will enhance the reputation of the Assembly as being truly democratic, workable and of benefit to the citizens of Canberra.
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