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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 7 Hansard (17 October) . . Page.. 1682 ..

We request that the Legislative Assembly recognise the Christian beliefs of the majority of A.C.T. residents, and to rescind the motion that abolished the opening prayer.

And your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.

The petition read as follows:

To the Speaker and Members of the Legislative Assembly for the Australian Capital Territory:

The petition of certain residents of the Australian Capital Territory draws to the attention of the Assembly our deep concern with the decision to abandon the formal prayer at the beginning of each sitting day of the Legislative Assembly. We believe this goes far beyond a well held practice in all other Parliaments in the Australian Commonwealth and was made without proper consideration of the opinions of the people of the Australian Capital Territory. We believe that no Party or individual has a mandate to endorse this decision.

We request that the formal prayer for God's blessings on the Assembly be restored to its rightful place at the beginning of each sitting day.

Petitions received.

MR BERRY (10.31): I present the report of the Select Committee on Workers Compensation Provisions entitled "Report by the Select Committee on Workers Compensation Provisions", together with extracts from the minutes of proceedings. I move:

That the report be noted.

It is a particular pleasure to be able to continue Labor's tradition of ensuring safe workplaces and guarding the rights of workers in the Territory. Labor's first Bill in the First Assembly was the Occupational Health and Safety Bill, and throughout this Assembly we have defended the rights of ACT workers in both the public sector and the private sector at every opportunity. Following the last election we heard, with some concern, statements from the Government complaining about the workers compensation insurance provider in the ACT, Comcare. It was suggested that we would be handing that service over to the private sector and that, for some reason, that change would sort out all the problems. I was very sceptical about that because I knew that those suggestions were quite wrong.

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