Page 1363 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 12 May 1993
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Madam Speaker, and I believe that Mr Kaine, in his comments on those propositions, is absolutely correct. I know that Mr Kaine has been an ardent supporter of self-government. I know also that it has been Liberal policy for at least five years, and I am not aware that there has been any change from that policy. Madam Speaker, I would urge all members to vote against this motion, although I expect that Mrs Carnell, to be consistent with her recent statements, ought to feel at least morally obliged to support it.
MRS CARNELL (Leader of the Opposition) (3.28): May I start by restating the obvious? The Liberal Party totally supports self-government in the ACT.
Ms Follett: No, it is just you who does not. We know that.
MRS CARNELL: We totally support self-government in the ACT. What the Liberal Party also supports is community consultation and what the Liberal Party will be doing is embarking upon a structured and appropriate market research plan to find out what the people of the ACT really want, not just in the area of government but in lots of other areas. I know that that causes huge problems for the Labor Government, a government that has always suggested that it was heavily into consultation and in fact has come up with a number of plans, papers and whatever on community consultation, all of which were totally ignored.
What the Liberal Party is planning to do and has decided to do and has embarked upon is going down the track of an appropriate planned and professional approach to find out what the community want. What the Liberal Party has said is - surprise, surprise - that, if the people of the ACT are unhappy about their present style of government, then the Liberal Party - again surprise, surprise - will actually respond to that. We will see how we can better put together a Legislative Assembly, or whatever we call it, to reflect the wishes of the people of Canberra.
Quite honestly, the hypocrisy of the comments that the Chief Minister made before was stunning. Again I quote the hypocrisy of her comments. She said, quite categorically, that she needed - - -
Mr Lamont: This will be the same Liberal market research that gave us the GST and Fightback.
MRS CARNELL: I cannot yell that much.
MADAM SPEAKER: Order, please! Continue, Mrs Carnell.
MRS CARNELL: Thank you. The Chief Minister said that she wanted to see line and verse of what the Liberal Party were talking about before our public consultation, before we knew what the community wanted. Does that not reflect really interestingly on the Labor Party's attitude to the republic debate, the republic debate that we are supposed to have, not just as the ACT, but in Australia, with no information, with no knowledge of what we are really talking about, just a sort of an idea? We are supposed to be able to have a debate on that, quite rationally and quite acceptably, with no information, with no details; but when it comes to debating what the people of Canberra might want, what might reflect what they want as a community, all of a sudden we hear, "Oh, no, we cannot have that. It is totally unacceptable. We have to have all of the info before we even start the debate".
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