Page 4192 - Week 13 - Thursday, 25 November 1993
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MR STEVENSON (4.45): This action is unprecedented, but we should look at the sequence of events that led to it being taken. First of all, the Labor Party made a decision to cut the number of teachers; not cut the budget, but cut the number of teachers. The Labor Party are well aware that that is not supported by the majority will of the people in Canberra. Nevertheless, they did it and, after being reminded again and again, they failed to change. So this Assembly, on behalf of the will of the people in Canberra, carried a motion requiring that that action not be taken. Mr Wood said that it was an important motion, but proceeded to say - I paraphrase - that he would not take any notice of it. Then we passed a motion censuring Mr Wood and the Treasurer. It was said very clearly that we did not want this reduction of teachers. We called on that decision to be reversed, but it was not reversed.
This is not the last resort. Two other actions can be taken. If the second last does not work, the last resort must be taken. The second but one is a vote of no confidence in the Education Minister. But passing a vote of no confidence in the Education Minister because of cuts to the number of schoolteachers in Canberra is absolutely useless unless the majority of people in this Assembly are prepared to enforce it. The only way you can enforce that is to then move a motion of no confidence in the Chief Minister. The moment you are convincing enough that you will do that, action will be taken.
Crying wolf is not the answer. If the majority of members in this Assembly want something done, they cannot allow Ministers or the Government to ignore their directions. In the past, unfortunately, we have allowed those directions to be ignored, with the inevitable result that now we get ignored. That is not surprising. Mr Wood said that if this action is taken he can carry on unaffected. "I can carry on unaffected", he said. That was an interjection he made. If that is the case, I dare say that other action will be taken; and it must be enforced, logically, by a no-confidence motion in the Chief Minister if nothing is done about an Education Minister who is prepared yet again to ignore a direction from this Assembly.
Mr Connolly brought up the point that I have held as a principle for a long time that laws should be able to be understood - they should be in plain English - and, secondly, that laws should not be rushed through the house. I am not the only person who stands for that. The vast majority of people in the community believe that laws affecting their lives, governing their lives, should be able to be understood without having to go along to Mr Connolly, in his past occupation, and his colleagues to find out what on earth things mean. I remind the Assembly that at one time I moved to change our standing orders in order to allow a minimum of two months before any law could be passed through this Assembly, provided that it was not urgent or not declared so following debate by this Assembly. Unfortunately, I just missed out on that one! The vote was 16 to one.
Mr De Domenico: Close!
MR STEVENSON: That was close! I worded the proposed change to say that after 30 days we could discuss the matter before the Assembly without having to have an in-principle debate. We would not have to say whether we were committed to something or not. At that time we could also bring up amendments.
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