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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 8 Hansard (26 October) . . Page.. 2077 ..

MRS CARNELL: I think that is totally ridiculous. The moment we even suggest that that is a reasonable approach, we are ruling out a very large percentage of people from standing for this Assembly. They will not even think about it if it immediately rules out their partners' businesses or their families' businesses from dealing with one of the largest chunks of this Territory's economy.

There is no doubt that process must be followed. One of the things that we have to do when we are elected to this place is to stipulate very clearly in a statement of interests not just what we own but also what our partners have shares in, so that it is on the public record for anybody who chooses to look. If we do not do that ethically or honestly, we deserve everything we get. If everything is on the public record, surely as long as process is followed our partners and our families can continue to conduct business in this city. If they cannot, we have a very real problem.

Last week, when this line of questioning started and it started to appear that those opposite believed that that was not all right, that partners and families could not run businesses in this town, I wrote to the Auditor-General with a great deal of concern. I know that other members, not of the Liberal Party, were concerned, too, because their partners worked in various ways, on contract and so on, for the Government. I wrote to the Auditor-General asking whether he would be interested in putting together guidelines that would assist MLAs and government officials in making decisions on matters that would affect, or be influenced by, members of their families.

In situations where members of families are dealing with government, whether as employees on a contract or through selling goods to government or selling goods on behalf of government, guidelines need to be set in place. To illustrate the point, I instanced the case that we have been discussing in this house over the last couple of weeks. The public record shows exactly what I asked the Auditor-General to do. The Auditor-General wrote back and said that he would be delighted to establish those guidelines. He said that as I had already mentioned a particular case he would use that case to investigate the issues generally. Right from the beginning I spelt out the Harold Hird and Associates case in my letter to the Auditor-General to illustrate the problem that we have. The Auditor-General, rightly, is investigating this on the basis of my alluding to it right from the beginning.

I wonder whether this Assembly understands the damage that this could be doing to a small business in this town.

Ms McRae: What about the damage you did to Charles Wright?

MRS CARNELL: Interestingly, you moved a censure because you said that it was totally unacceptable behaviour. You moved a censure motion because you said that it was unacceptable to use this place supposedly to bring forward this sort of information. Quite seriously, the hypocrisy is stunning here. What we potentially could be doing here is damaging a small business - - -

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