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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 7 Hansard (17 October) . . Page.. 1739 ..

Mr Berry: Mr Speaker - - -

MR HUMPHRIES: Instead, she puts her lackey up there to take a point of order and take the heat off her. Come on, do your job, Wayne.

Mr Berry: I wish you would do yours properly. I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I ask that the word "hypocrite" be withdrawn.

MR SPEAKER: Mr Berry, I listened very carefully. Mr Humphries referred to hypocrisy and hypocrites. He was not, as far as I am aware, referring to a particular individual as a hypocrite.

Mr Berry: Yes, he was. Mr Speaker, would you revisit the Hansard and report back on the matter?

MR SPEAKER: I would be happy to do that, Mr Berry.

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Speaker, if the cap hurts, I withdraw that phrase.

MR SPEAKER: In that case I do not need to revisit the matter, Mr Berry.

MR HUMPHRIES: Some other extraordinary statements were made in this highly disingenuous speech. Ms Follett claimed that this affects all parties in the Territory; but there are only two parties in this Territory that at the last election actually chose to put how-to-vote cards to what was ultimately their most important test. Mr Connolly correctly distinguished between advisory information to electors, which told them about the party and the candidates without saying, "You should vote for candidates in this order", and those which were in the traditional sense how-to-vote cards. Those two parties were the ACT Greens and the Labor Party. Those parties undoubtedly will be affected by this approach, but it endorses the fundamental principle of the Hare-Clark system - a principle that either has not sifted down to the minds of most of those opposite, or they fully understand but are not prepared to accept - which is that under this system voters are the powerful parties. Voters determine which candidates and which parties get elected - not a party that says, "You shall vote for candidate A first and candidate B next and then candidate C after that", but a party that says, "You, the electors of this Territory, have the right to determine which of our offering of candidates should be elected to serve in the parliament".

That is a fundamental extension to the rights of people in this community. It is an extension that is inherent in the Hare-Clark system and that ought to have been enacted on the day we enacted the original legislation to establish Hare-Clark in this Territory, but it did not happen because of that nefarious alliance between the Australian Labor Party and Mr Dennis Stevenson. What a sad day for the once mighty, once glorious Labor Party - having to resort to quoting a Dennis poll to prove a point! Dear, oh dear! The sad visage of this proud party in the gutter really was quite breathtaking, Mr Speaker.

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