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That does not in any way undermine the seriousness with which we take sexual harassment allegations. We supported the legislation, as did everybody in this Assembly. Obviously, these are serious issues. Allegations of sexual harassment must never be taken lightly. Ms Follett made comments about making sure that we encourage women - and it is predominantly women - to come forward. We totally support that. Certainly, debates like the one we are having today would go a long way to encouraging women to come forward when they are likely to end up the subject of debates in the Assembly and not be allowed to have the issue handled where it should be, in the Human Rights Office! That is the sort of absolute hypocrisy we have seen all the way through this whole debate. With a hand-on-heart approach, Labor is saying, “We really do not like getting involved with this”, while they are still ringing up and talking to everyone they can possibly think of - and not just with regard to Mr De Domenico either. I have heard the most remarkable things being said about at least one other member of this Assembly. These sorts of things simply are not on in this place - or never have been before.

What we have in this particular case is one ex-staff member who has brought allegations against Mr De Domenico - allegations that must be heard in the appropriate manner by the human rights commissioner. As Mr Humphries said, there are very definite requirements for timeframes to ensure that the process is allowed to go through. Both parties - both the person who has alleged sexual harassment and the person who is at the other end of those allegations - are allowed time to respond. The human rights commissioner has to have time to do the bits of the whole process she must do and make the determinations she must make. That is the process. We would be thrilled for this process to be quicker. We would love to have had the matter heard before the election, but we will not interfere in what must be an arm’s length approach to this sort of issue. That is the bottom line.

We have allegations from one ex-staff member. What Ms Follett forgot to say is that the statement I made referred to that one ex-staff member not being backed up by other staff members, unlike in the Terry Griffiths affair, where I think in the end 12 staff members were making similar allegations. Here we have one, not backed up by other staff. That is not to say that the allegations are right or wrong, but what we have here is one set of allegations. We have a proper process that must be followed. We are very happy to allow that process to continue, hopefully sooner rather than later. Ms Follett, and for that matter Mr Connolly, made comments about “the process” and how we would be totally stepping outside what was accepted practice in all parliaments around Australia. Apart from the Terry Griffiths affair, where in the end there were some 12 sets of allegations, it is very hard, certainly in the Federal Parliament, to find any circumstances where sexual harassment has actually required a Minister to stand down.

Probably the important issue here is to have a look at the ACT, because that is where we live. We have two instances in the ACT - one at the Federal level and one in the ACT Assembly - of Ministers being subject to inquiries. One was Ros Kelly in the sports rorts affair. Did Ros Kelly stand down? No, she did not stand down. Through the whole inquiry she stayed there. The other one, of course, was in this Assembly and involved Mr Berry. Did Mr Berry stand down from his ministry? Did Mr Berry stop being deputy leader? No. He stood aside from sport, and sport only. He stayed in his position as a Minister. He stood down from one small set of responsibilities for the time.

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