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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 9 Hansard (21 November) . . Page.. 2176 ..

MR HIRD: I will table it, but I would like to read out part of it. It says:

... the Chair Roberta McRae, had expressed a strong view to the Government on where its priorities should lie and where cost-cutting was clearly unacceptable.

The Committee's recommendations included the need to:

. restore the $3.8 million ...

It does not say "consider". It does not say that at all. Further on the press release says this:

If the Government does not heed this unanimous Report, then Labor MLAs will not support the Budget ...

Ms McRae: Whose press release is that?

MR HIRD: Yours.

Ms McRae: Has it my name on it?

MR HIRD: Do not worry; I will give you a copy if you want it. It goes on to say:

There is clearly all-Party support within the Assembly ...

You take it out of context. That is typical of those people across the other side. That is why they are in opposition. I will give that to you if you like. I hope Ms McRae has learnt her lesson. These very important deliberations of this very important select committee must be apolitical, as they have been in the past. The rules are now changing, not only for this committee but also for other committees. We should not go to a compromise situation. What we should do now is tough it out and bring in minority reports. That is what you have started.

I believe that the Carnell Government is to be congratulated because in its first year in office it has brought in the new style three-year budget program which corrects the financial mismanagement of the previous Follett Government. A former Auditor-General once said that the cupboard was bare. It certainly was bare in March of this year. It had nothing in it. We will put the financial arrangements back into the black at the end of the next triennium, all things being equal.

I would like to thank the staff and all those people who assisted the committee in its deliberations. It was a difficult time. We pushed it through. It is a shame that the blight on this committee was caused by the action taken by the chair. I hope that she has learnt her lesson. If she has not learnt her lesson it does not augur well for our committee system in this parliament.

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