Page 2927 - Week 11 - Thursday, 22 October 1992
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MR MOORE (3.56): Madam Speaker, it was interesting in Mr Kaine's speech that he made a strong point about the community and other schools being deprived of money because of the reopening of these schools. This is the line that the Liberals have tried to run this past year and a few months. The truth of the matter, the reality of the matter, is that the deprivation of money came from their action in incorrectly and wrongly closing schools in the ACT. That other people have had to spend some money to reopen those, for social justice, is another question altogether.
The question that we are examining here today, Madam Speaker, really boils down to some information that has been presented on the one hand by the Minister and some information that has been presented in this extract from a letter - "letter", I think, was the term that Mr Kaine used, although he is not prepared to table the whole thing, just a page of it - and that - - -
Mr Humphries: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker.
MR MOORE: I will be happy if he is prepared to table it.
Mr Humphries: As I understand it, Mr Kaine has tabled the document from which he was reading. Mr Moore is effectively accusing him of lying in not tabling the document he was reading from.
MR MOORE: No, I am not; not at all. You misunderstand. I will clarify it.
MADAM SPEAKER: Thank you. Please clarify that, and then I will take the point of order.
MR MOORE: Thank you, Madam Speaker. I said that Mr Kaine had not tabled the full letter. He tabled a page from a letter. He was the one who said that it was an extract from a letter, but he said that he did not have the full document down here. He tabled a letter. That is how I understand his explanation. This is a page from a letter that Mr Kaine identified as being the information from a person he described as Mr Eric Willmot - in fact, somebody who often refers to himself as Dr Eric Willmot. Mr Humphries and I have had a debate in this house before today as to whether or not that was an honorary degree and whether or not he should be entitled to call himself "Dr". I will not pursue that any further.
What is important, Madam Speaker, is that we really have a difference of opinion in some ways between what is on this paper and what the Minister and the Chief Minister are presenting. The Leader of the Opposition has chosen to move a censure motion on the strength of this information, and I can understand that. However, I think we need to put it into perspective. I go back to the Estimates Committee report on the Appropriation Bill 1990-91, paragraph 2.13, under the title "Misleading Evidence". It states:
During the course of the inquiry the Committee formed the view that one senior public servant had misled the Committee when giving evidence.
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