Page 558 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 12 April 1994
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Mr Deputy Speaker, we have two situations here - selective tabling of documents so as to suggest something other than the truth, and refusal to answer questions properly asked about this particular incident. I would respectfully submit that Mr Berry has selectively tabled documents - for example, the document relating to inducements - and he has refused or failed to answer questions concerning this matter, and in both of those circumstances he has misled this house as to the outcome of the VITAB arrangement and its effect on the ACT. He has taken those steps, I submit, with the deliberate and clear intention of creating the impression that all was all right with this deal when he knew for a fact that it was not.
As Mr De Domenico and Mrs Carnell have indicated, the Victorian TAB wrote to ACTTAB on 31 January this year giving six months' notice of ACTTAB's exclusion from the linked betting superpool arrangements. After that period the ACT will get the chop from the superpool arrangements. Mr Berry, at various stages, has asserted that this situation would leave the ACT in no worse position than it is now. At other times - - -
Mr Berry: No, that is not right. I said that we could survive.
MR HUMPHRIES: Yes, you have, Mr Berry. Mr Deputy Speaker, I think Mr Berry said that that is a lie, and I ask that he withdraw that.
Mr Berry: No, I did not. I said that we could survive.
MR HUMPHRIES: The acoustics in this chamber are not as good as they might be. Mr Deputy Speaker, we assert, quite justifiably, that the giving of notice constitutes a serious threat to ACTTAB's continuing operation and to its profitability. Mr Berry variously has alleged at various times that it is not a problem, that, yes, it is a problem, and that we have to do all we can to rejoin some linked arrangement with another State TAB. I think it is quite clear that the fact that ACTTAB is in the process of being excluded from the superpool of VicTAB is a very serious indicator of problems with our TAB. Mr Berry knew, presumably on or very soon after 31 January, that we were being expelled. He must, therefore, also have been aware that we were in serious difficulties if that arrangement persisted and no alternative arrangement could be found.
What did Mr Berry do? Apparently Mr Berry did not go to the New South Wales TAB straightaway and say, "We want a pooling arrangement", because he announced in a press release some eight weeks later, or thereabouts, that he was about to do that. Apparently, in the intervening eight weeks or so, he did not bother to go forward and attempt to make negotiations with the New South Wales TAB to overcome the difficulty that he encountered by being expelled from VicTAB. So the Minister has not done that. The Minister, on the other hand, apparently has made some attempt to find out from the Victorian TAB the reasons for the expulsion. At least, that is the suggestion that he has made in this place. But, either way, it must be said that six weeks or so after the expulsion from the Victorian TAB was announced we had not resolved the problem of ACTTAB's link with some other pool arrangement. We had not resolved the question at that stage; so there was, at the very least, a serious question mark hanging over our own TAB and over its future and over its profitability.
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