Page 2002 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 15 June 1994
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INQUIRY INTO CONTRACT BETWEEN ACTTAB AND VITAB LTD
Report and Government Response
Debate resumed.
MR DE DOMENICO: Madam Speaker, none of us can stand here and completely lay the blame at the feet of the ACTTAB board and its chief executive because, as I have said before, it was the former Minister, Mr Berry, who appointed the chairman of the board; it was the former Minister, Mr Berry, who appointed the deputy chairman of the board; and it was the former Minister, Mr Berry, who took complete control of this board and this TAB's operations. I said at the beginning of my remarks that I would be passionate and political because that is what it is all about. It is all about the politics of the situation.
Mr Berry had in place a quite good board, a quite good structure. (Extension of time granted) Thank you, members. Mr Berry, of his volition, for his own reasons, came into this place and wanted more control. This place, for its own reasons, gave him that control. There is no denying that. Mr Berry then proceeded to appoint certain individuals and this Opposition publicly expressed concern about it. Mr Berry then, in his usual way, called it all a political stunt. Not one year later, Mr Berry's successor, Mr Lamont, in a moment of fulminating pique over the long weekend, sacked the very people in whom Mr Berry had so much confidence. Who were some of these people? We said that if the Minister continues to appoint people because of their political leanings and not because of their expertise you are going to get into trouble eventually, and that is what happened in this situation.
There is one thing I need to say, Madam Speaker, in my concluding remarks. If the names of any of these people found to be incompetent by both Professor Pearce and Mr Lamont, the new Minister, appear on any other ACT board, committee, advisory council or anything else, this Government had better make sure that it expunges them. In order to be very fair, that is what has to happen.
The Government also has to have a second good look at the Pearce report because it was not only the ACTTAB board and its chief executive who were blamed for incompetence. As I said before, if Mr Berry and Ms Robinson are to be believed about having told very senior bureaucrats to undertake probity checks, the Government needs to look at that as well. If Mr Townsend is to be believed, then the advice of Ms Robinson and Mr Berry to Professor Pearce was not correct. One or the other must be right. Professor Pearce also expressed concern about why nobody in the bureaucracy, either in DELP or anywhere else, had the temerity to say, "Stop there; let us have a closer look at this contract". We all know, Madam Speaker, that this contract allows VITAB an out but does not allow the ACT an out. If that is good law, we should not be here talking about it. We all know that it allows VITAB an out, but allows the ACT Government no way out. It is not a good deal, but no-one saw fit to have a look at that.
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