Page 1393 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 11 May 1994
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The money involved is massive. Anybody involved in public administration of drugs, for example, comes up against enormous incentives to ignore the law, and some people succumb to that kind of temptation. Perhaps it was always so, but I do not think it was so to the extent that it is today. I use that as one example, because it is not only drugs in connection with which there are massive incentives. We went through a debate recently about X-rated and violent videos, where there is no doubt that there were certain incentives; I do not know whether that is still true.
These are massive changes in the way government works, in the way politics operates, in the way the administration works, and in community attitudes to what people do. The old checks and balances of government are perhaps no longer appropriate. They do not work any more, because the whole infrastructure within which they have to work has changed. That is why it is important that we look at a subject such as this. Within the whole mechanism there are thousands of individuals working, and when corrupt or inappropriate behaviour takes place they see it, and they may be the only people who do. I think it is true to say that the people who are working in the system are the first ones to see when something is wrong, and they are probably the best qualified to notice when something is wrong; but, with the way the system works, although there are incentives to corrupt behaviour and the like, there are very few incentives to correct the situation when somebody perceives that something is wrong. Indeed, within the corporate entity there are often very great disincentives to seeing that something is done. That is why we need to provide some protection for people who, having perceived that there is something wrong, decide to do something about it. Despite their commitment to the corporation, to the corporate ethic, to the body they work for, despite their loyalties, when they decide that something is so wrong that they need to bring it to the attention of proper authorities and have something done about it, they need and deserve protection. That is why this is so important.
I am very interested that the Chief Minister has suddenly become most interested in this legislation and an expert on it. Only last year, when the Leader of the Opposition indicated that she was going to bring forward legislation such as this, the Attorney-General said, "We do not need it". In February, when the Government was considering the first draft of the public administration Act, it was not included. So it is only since February that the Government has decided that this kind of legislation is needed and the Chief Minister has become an expert on it.
Mr Humphries: She went to Damascus.
MR KAINE: I suspect that she walked down the road to Damascus somewhere between the middle of last year and now. Presumably the Attorney-General has also.
Listening to the Chief Minister's comments on Mrs Carnell's Bill, it seemed to me that, despite the fact that she had obviously been well briefed to participate in today's debate, she really does not understand the subject, any more than she understood the purpose of the Bill yesterday, when she sought advice from her advisers, could not get it, and had to adjourn the debate because she did not understand her own Bill. I suspect that she does not understand this one either. I suspect that she does not understand her own Bill, which
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