Page 3949 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 23 November 1993
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outrageous claims about my competence. He has no entitlement. Mr Moore is being entirely irresponsible. He is being entirely self-serving, and I think it is a disgraceful misuse of the forms and processes of this Assembly. I would understand it if he came back and spoke about the US and what was going on. I do not argue about his policies, if those areas are elucidated. I do not argue about it. I am almost in total agreement. Let him talk about that, because he has credibility in that area, but not in education. This motion is not valid. It is simply not fair and it is not supportable. I believe that it is a measure of Mr Moore's weakness and of his damaged ego. I think the motion deserves only contempt.
I will make some comments about what Mr Moore said in his speech. He quoted from a document put out by secondary principals. I will make just one point about that. This document, as far as I have read it, nowhere says that we will remove one of the privileges that some colleges are using - the employment of relief teachers to supervise examinations. I think they should remove that. I wonder what you think about that. This, I believe, and I am not fully into it, is a political document. I do not know that it is an educational document.
Mr Moore began by saying that I had asserted - he is quite right - that we give our highest priority to education. We do. We still do. Mr Moore, we face a declining budget in the ACT - a point that I do not think you have missed. Our budget is reducing. I cannot sustain education at the current level while the rest of the budget is reducing. It is simply not a possibility. If that total budget declines and we maintain our relative position, we maintain our highest priority. That is clearly the case. We do have the highest priority in education. If you think that you can sustain education expenditures at the previous high levels for ever and ever you are wrong. I know that you do not believe that, and the Liberals do not believe that. You know that those levels of spending cannot be sustained. But we can accommodate to the change while maintaining the excellence of our education system. Madam Speaker, I do not know what the Liberals will do here. I will wait and see. This proposal is simply contemptible.
MS FOLLETT (Chief Minister and Treasurer) (3.46): Madam Speaker, as Mr Wood has said, this motion is an absolute fraud. It is particularly disappointing coming from Mr Moore. I urge members to reject absolutely this motion. I know that all members of this Assembly, in their heart of hearts, know that they could not find a more caring, a more competent and a more careful Minister than Mr Wood. You all know that. If you vote in any other way, you are frauds too. Madam Speaker, Mr Moore, in his remarks, such as they were - intemperate hyperbole as usual - pointed to no deficiency in this Minister's performance. He pointed to no impropriety in this Minister's performance. His accusation against this Minister was of carrying out Government policy; a policy, of course, with which Mr Moore disagrees. That is not grounds for removing a Minister, or for supporting a no-confidence motion in that Minister, and Mr Moore knows that. This is a sham on his part and it has come a bit too late.
Mr Wood correctly pointed out Mr Moore's long absences at the time when the Government was working hard on these matters. He could equally have pointed out Mr Moore's most recent considerable absence, at drugs conferences overseas, when he could have been here at yet another rally out the front of the Assembly to talk about the education budget; but he was not. I think Mr Moore's priorities
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