Page 559 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 12 April 1994
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Mr Berry was asked about the arrangements in this place. He was asked about the efficacy and the effect of the VITAB deal in this place. Mr Berry knew - he must have known, Madam Speaker - that the VITAB deal had a great deal to do with the expulsion from VicTAB. He knew that, Madam Speaker. To pretend that he had no inkling of that being the case, frankly, is disingenuous. Of course Mr Berry knew that, and he came into this place and said of the VITAB deal, "It is safe for the ACT and it returns a profit, so that is good news on both scores". Good news on both scores; safe for the ACT! Even today, three months or so after the decision has been made to expel us from VicTAB, when we still do not have an arrangement with New South Wales and we have not repaired the arrangement with Victoria, and nobody else is on side to take us on board and bail us out of the sea, Mr Berry still insists that it is safe. Mr Berry still seems to think that nothing has gone wrong.
Mrs Carnell: He said that on radio this morning.
MR HUMPHRIES: He said it this morning on the radio - everything is okay, everything is hunky-dory. You know that it is not hunky-dory; you know that things have gone wrong. Yet you say to this place:
We know a good deal when we see one. What we also did, and what I personally was involved in, was to make sure that the deal was safe with respect to the Territory.
You have said that what has happened is that the ACT Labor Government has struck a good deal. You knew when you said those things that they were not true; yet you repeated them again and again.
The intention in saying that, Madam Speaker, was not just to try to deflect Opposition attacks on the very issues which have now revealed themselves to be such a major problem, but in fact to create for us, for observers of this place and for the public of the ACT the impression that the ACTTAB was sailing through calm waters; that there were no problems; that, by implication, there would be no suggestion that we would have been expelled from any other linked TAB and we would therefore face a serious threat to our profitability and the viability of our TAB in the future. That is the only reasonable interpretation of Mr Berry's comments. Would a Minister who wanted to put all the information, the full facts, before the Assembly have declined to mention to this place that we had been expelled from the Victoria TAB? Did Mr Berry forget? Did he overlook this fact? Was it not in his briefing papers? Did he not think it was important? What excuse is there? There is not an excuse, Madam Speaker. There is no excuse.
Madam Speaker, there is also evidence, I think, in the language Mr Berry has used in this place, that when he returned to this place in late February and early March and continued to defend the VITAB deal, and continued to make no reference to the fact that we had been expelled from the Victorian TAB, he knew what had happened; he knew that it was relevant to what was going on with the TAB's future and he knew that he had to distance himself from this arrangement. Let me quote a few things that he said in November and December. I just want to read these phrases:
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