Page 4191 - Week 13 - Thursday, 25 November 1993
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Mr Moore: I have never said that.
MR WOOD: All right; if you have not said that, I apologise. Ms Szuty, I know, wants an electorate allowance, as I have said before, to help her dress, and that is a priority. Can you imagine? Ms Szuty wants to establish a unit in the Government for aerosol painting sprees. That is the measure of some of their ideas. I would not claim that it is their highest priority, but that is the measure of some of the suggestions we get on how to spend our money.
Mr Moore: This is gutter stuff again. You are going back down into the gutter again, as you did on Tuesday.
MR WOOD: You say these things. They will come back to you. There is no question about that. I have mixed views about this amendment. It is a nonsense. It really is. The fact is that it means nothing. I can find no inhibition in this - - -
Mr De Domenico: Do not worry about it if it means nothing.
MR WOOD: I am saying that. Will you listen? I can find no inhibition on what I may do. You have come up with a motion that, certainly in the space of time we have had it, cannot be seen to follow a coherent argument; that cannot be seen to make sense. You have no definitions.
Mr Moore: Why are you so upset?
MR WOOD: I am upset because you are repudiating your election promise. Mr Moore got into this Assembly by hanging onto Rosemary Follett's coat-tails. He said to the electorate, "I will support Rosemary Follett as Chief Minister and I will support her budget". Now he wants to hack around with the budget, and he will come up with some spurious arguments to try to justify that. I am angry; but principally I am angry because you are going down the path of irresponsibility. Next year, with this precedent, should it be set, you will say, "What do we want money for? Aerosol units somewhere in the arts branch. Let us have money for that".
Ms Follett: What about the jewellery allowance?
MR WOOD: That might come up, too, in other areas. The potential for future budgets, while there is a minority government, will be, "What do you want out there? We will give it to you". The Liberals are so desperate to win the next election that they will do anything.
Mr Kaine: We will romp it in, mate.
MR WOOD: I hope that this community is not as gullible as that. If we go down this path of irresponsibility, of not accepting the imperatives of the day, in a few years this Territory will be in considerable difficulty. Let us pray that Rosemary Follett, after the next election, leads a majority government and that good sense, good management and responsibility may continue.
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