Page 1987 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 15 June 1994
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You wonder how many quotes there are that say exactly the same thing; yet witness after witness told Professor Pearce that they noticed no change in the relationship between ACTTAB, the department and the Minister's office throughout the VITAB affair after the decorporatisation.
It is disturbing, too, to note that the report finds that the former Minister was not well advised, either by his staff or by his department. Significant discrepancies exist between the evidence of Mr Berry's adviser and that of the then head of DELP, Mr Jeff Townsend. Either someone was not quite telling the truth or there was a massive breakdown in communications that should never have happened at the highest levels of ACT Government. The reflection the report casts on the performance of some senior departmental officers is less than favourable also, in my view. Professor Pearce has found that the Department of the Environment, Land and Planning paid less heed to the effect of the contract than was desirable. I quote his findings:
... the ACT did have an interest in the VITAB contract, namely its possible impact on government revenue and the subsidy for racing. This seems to have been given scant attention by the Department ...
He went on to note that the department should have put greater effort into understanding the possible outcomes of the contract and sought briefings from ACTTAB. As we all now know, it was the department that advised the Minister to give the final direction to ACTTAB to sign the contract with VITAB, yet it did this without making virtually any checks as to whether the proper processes had been followed. Indeed, the Pearce report states:
... applying the final check before a Minister takes action is what a public servant is employed to do. It was not done here and the Minister paid the price.
The Opposition believes that the department acted less than competently through this affair, as, of course, does Professor Pearce. Indeed, it was clear from the public hearings that the department and the Government generally engaged in a concerted campaign to dump on ACTTAB so as to absolve itself from responsibility.
Ministerial responsibility also flows through to the breakdown in communication which appears to have occurred between the Minister and his senior adviser. Professor Pearce states:
I also consider that the Minister's adviser, Ms Robinson, did not provide him with the standard of advice that could have been expected.
Madam Speaker, if the conduct of a Minister's personal staff is not the responsibility of the Minister himself, then Professor Pearce has effectively said to parliaments across Australia that ministerial responsibility counts for very little indeed. So, to quote one Canberra Times journalist, where has this orgy of finger-pointing taken us?
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