Page 3829 - Week 14 - Thursday, 10 December 1992
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MR LAMONT: Yes, you did. He is looking bewildered now. He cannot even remember what he said.
Mr De Domenico: I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I suggest that Mr Lamont get his facts right instead of - - -
MADAM SPEAKER: Mr De Domenico, if you want to make a personal explanation, ask me for leave and I will grant it.
Mr De Domenico: I seek leave to make a personal explanation.
MADAM SPEAKER: I am sorry. Not while a member is speaking; at the end of the speech.
MR LAMONT: Mr De Domenico cannot remember what he says from one minute to the next. How can people expect integrity following the election of anybody on the opposite side of this house to government in the ACT? That prospect will never ever have to face the people of the ACT. Those opposite will never sit on the government benches. They will never form a government. To that extent I suppose it is a bit of a waste of time to protest about what they are going to do, because they will never get the opportunity to implement it. They will never get the opportunity to implement it, because they endorse exactly the same policies as Jeff Kennett.
What did Mr Kennett do? Before the election Mr Kennett said, "Men and women of Victoria, I support those policies by Dr John and by honest John". That is what Kennett went to the election on. What happened three days after he was elected? He whacked out the rug on the leave loading; he sacked 9,000 public servants. A great employment program! He sacked 9,000 teachers. That was exactly what he was proposing to do. Then what did he do, Madam Speaker? Remember that this is the Premier who said that he endorsed the GST and Fightback. That is the way he went into the election. Then what did he do? He turned around and said, "Let us change workers compensation".
Mr De Domenico: Which was losing billions of dollars.
MR LAMONT: What did he do? Mr De Domenico obviously supports it. What Mr Kennett decided to do was very simple. He said that if a builder's labourer had his leg cut off below the knee he was not entitled to compensation; he should not be compensated for that. Mr Kennett said, "We can give him a notional salary. We can ascribe this notional salary. If he was employed as a clerk he would be able to earn $30,000 a year. Because of that he can still earn $30,000 a year and he is not entitled to any compensation". That is the gist of the types of policies that these people opposite support.
Mr De Domenico: That is outrageous, and you know that it is.
MR LAMONT: You are certainly right, Mr De Domenico.
Mr Humphries: It is scaremongering.
MR LAMONT: That is not scaremongering; that is fact. That is pure and simple fact. I know that Mr De Domenico knows better than that, because I and Mr De Domenico, along with a number of other Canberrans, in 1982 sat down to review the ACT Workmen's Compensation Act, as it was then called. It is now the Workers Compensation Act. That was not the view that Mr De Domenico
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