Page 542 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 12 April 1994
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VITAB Ltd successfully gained a licence to operate totalisator betting facilities in Vanuatu a few months ago and has since been engaged in negotiation with a number of Australian TABs to provide the necessary computer technology and operational support.
He also said:
... it is VITAB which is providing the capital and bearing the business risks, not ACTTAB or the ACT Government.
Once Mr Berry locked himself into those two statements, there was no turning back. The trail of misleading and deception started and continued beyond Ms Follett's decision finally to accede to an inquiry. If Mr Berry had done his job properly, he would have, or ought to have, known what everybody else knows - that ACTTAB competed against nobody. In fact, as Mrs Carnell said, only two TABs were approached - coincidentally, the two in ALP jurisdictions: Queensland, who told VITAB, literally on the spot, that it could not deal with it, and ACTTAB, who came in hook, line and sinker, because the Minister directed ACTTAB to do the deal.
On face value, one could initially have some sympathy for the Minister's enthusiasm for such a statement. After all, on the same day in Canberra, 8 November 1993, the same statement was made by none other than the Hon. Bob Hawke - a shareholder, so people say, along with Dan Kolomanski - who said at the launch:
ACTTAB was selected by VITAB over a number of other Australian TABs.
He went on to refer to the various reasons. How ironic that yesterday the same Mr Hawke accused Mr Conrad Black of lying - really, the pot calling the kettle black. How proud Mr Berry must have been at being selected by VITAB. How very proud he was.
To reinforce this major coup, Mr Berry's office requested the department to prepare a ministerial statement on the ACTTAB-VITAB agreement so that Mr Berry could tell the Assembly and the rest of the world about this deal, and probably to follow the legal requirement for Mr Berry to table any direction given to ACTTAB within seven sitting days. The statement was duly prepared and approved by Mr Berry on 22 November 1993, but - surprise, surprise - Mr Berry did not make the statement to the Assembly. I now seek leave to table the statement and Mr Berry's signed approval of it and to have that incorporated in Hansard.
Leave granted.
Document incorporated at Appendix 1.
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