Page 3738 - Week 12 - Thursday, 21 October 1993
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Health Professionals - Shift Work
MR KAINE: Madam Speaker, I address a question to the Minister for Health. I know that he is not used to getting questions from Liberals, so I thought I would throw him one. Minister, earlier today the Minister for Urban Services eloquently defended the idea that people on shift work should work only four to five hours out of eight. I wonder whether you see any benefit in extending this innovative idea to people in your organisation on shift work, such as nurses, salaried doctors and community nurses?
MR BERRY: This is a nonsense. We are governed by awards which provide for certain wages and working conditions right throughout the Government Service. Until those awards are changed by way of sensible negotiation we will continue to uphold them.
Bill of Rights
MR HUMPHRIES: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Attorney-General, Mr Connolly. I refer the Minister to work on an ACT Bill of Rights, which was referred to in the budget documents and which he outlined in the Estimates Committee, as widely reported in the media subsequently. I also refer to comments by the Deputy Chief Minister on the radio this morning about the Bill of Rights. He said something to this effect: "As far as I know, nobody in the Government is workin' on this at the moment". Why has Minister Connolly not told his colleague Mr Berry about this Bill of Rights? Is it a cruel trick he is playing on poor Mr Berry or is it a deliberate decision, based on the fact that this Bill of Rights will enshrine the right to do productivity deals with right-wing unions or to have rank and file party preselection?
MR CONNOLLY: Madam Speaker, the Opposition really draws some long bows when they are desperate. The fact is, as came out in the Estimates Committee - it was not an announcement of Government policy - that we are doing some work on a Bill of Rights. It is an issue the Chief Minister has had an interest in for quite some time, after steering the discrimination legislation through this place. It is the logical next step and we are doing some preliminary work on it.
Mr Kaine: But you have not told the other members of the Executive.
MR CONNOLLY: No, I would not expect Mr Berry to be across the detail of the forward planning in an area in my department, just as he would not expect me to be across the details of the forward planning of the negotiation of the VMO contracts or whatever. Ministers are expected to be across what is going on in their own portfolios but not across somebody else's.
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