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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 11 Hansard (14 December) . . Page.. 3100 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

The Dennis Stevensons of this world have been replaced by people with a certain star quality. In this place we are often on TV, but with just a little more effort most of us could be in the movies. I would like to dwell for a moment on the dramatic potential within all of us.

It does not take much imagination, for example, to see you, Mr Speaker, in a role from the Mikado, the role of the Lord High Executioner. I see Ms Follett, for example, as an aspiring actress. At the beginning of the parliamentary year she was aspiring to be Chief Minister by Christmas; now she aspires to remain Leader of the Opposition by Christmas. Mr Speaker, I have often seen small children come to this place and sit in the rows at the back there, and I have seen the delight on their faces as they look across the chamber and believe that they spy a Disney character here in our midst. Of course, that character is Ms Horodny, who they think is the Drowsy Pixie or perhaps Tinkerbell.

Mr Speaker, when it comes to on-screen romances, who can beat Kate Carnell and Terry Connolly. Hugh Grant and Divine Brown, eat your heart out. Mr Speaker, I have a confession to make here. When I hear Ms McRae emit those long, drawn-out, evocative sighs of hers during speeches by Government members, I immediately think of the restaurant scene from When Harry met Sally, because of the almost orgasmic quality of her sighs. In fact, I have heard people in the gallery say, "I will have what she is having". Mr Osborne is the only member of this place who could be said to have starred already in his own right. Today Mr Osborne is still a team player in this place, except that now he specialises in another sport - synchronised swimming, with Mr Moore.

Mr Moore: Except that he is going further to the right.

MR HUMPHRIES: Yes. Who leads? That is the question. On the other hand, Mr Speaker, perhaps the better analogy is ballroom dancing. I well remember during the euthanasia debate seeing Mr Moore skilfully attempting to cha-cha Mr Osborne towards the pro-euthanasia side, only to have them both bowled over as Mr Wood and Mr Connolly waltzed furiously past on their way to the anti-euthanasia trophy.

Yes, Mr Speaker, I can easily picture Mr Kaine in the role of King Lear, or maybe one of those characters from Cocoon, and Mr Whitecross as one of those Amish farmers in the movie Witness. Mr Stefaniak, I am sure - I have another prop to use here - could land a role in Rocky VI, where his head would star as a punching bag and the members of the Opposition would star as those people using it. He would then go on to a starring role as a crash test dummy. Mr Speaker, I think that Mr Stefaniak really needs this helmet more than I do and I want him to have it for question time in future.

Mr Berry, who has been evacuated, funnily enough, I can see appearing in some kind of true life drama movie, and the plot goes something like this: He plays a politician who, after seven years of being misunderstood and reviled, finds finally a friend in the press gallery. His life changes after a rave review in the local newspaper.

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