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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 7 Hansard (18 October) . . Page.. 1830 ..

Mr Kaine: We are rapidly fixing the shortcomings of the previous Government.

MR DE DOMENICO: That is right. Before people start appropriating blame, Mr Kaine made the point, and I stress the point, that the previous Government was in power for some five years. You cannot stand here in some heraldic way and suggest that it is this Government's fault because things that should have been done perhaps five years ago have not been done within the nine months of this Government taking office.

Mr Speaker, in closing, before the election the Liberal Party made various promises in relation to sport. One was that we would increase the Health Promotion Fund to 5 per cent, like every other State and Territory. We have done that. There will be more money for sport out of that. We said that we would go ahead and construct the indoor sports facility in Tuggeranong. We have done that. We made a promise about refurbishing the Erindale sports complex. We have done that within nine months. Mr Speaker, you will find that what this Government promises it delivers.

Mr Berry: The highest youth unemployment in 21/2 years. A great job!

MR DE DOMENICO: I will take that comment aboard at another time and another place, Mr Berry, and show how simplistic, as usual, your interjections are. This Government in the nine months it has been in office has promised various things. What we promise we deliver. It might take longer than nine months, but I can assure you that it will not take the five years that it took the previous Government to do nothing.

MR STEFANIAK (Minister for Education and Training and Minister for Sport and Recreation) (4.28), in reply: Mr Speaker, I will take some of the last points first.

Mr Berry: Are you going to supply the tenth page?

MR STEFANIAK: I congratulate Mr Kaine, to start with, because you people might not realise it, but he has spoken twice in this debate. Well done, Trevor; you got in under there. No-one else could go, mate, and that I was very pleased to see. Mr Kaine hails from Tasmania via Victoria. Of course, on both occasions he quite rightly pointed out that there was one startling omission from the paper as he got it. You are right, Trevor. Page 10 must have been missing because there was not a reference to Australian rules. Of course, in terms of that end of the scale, this Government is certainly keen to attract an AFL team to Canberra and fully supports that. I am well aware of the questions down south in relation to Conder. It is a very big field. It may not be oval, but it is for use by Australian rules. Part of it will become oval so that it can be used by Australian rules. Mr Kaine also mentioned the Wanniassa playing fields. Soccer, I think, got two more fields there because of extensive use, but obviously Australian rules has to be catered for as well. Australian rules has a very good supporter and proponent in Mr Kaine. It was quite appropriate that he mentioned that and got in on two occasions rather than one.

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