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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 5 Hansard (14 May) . . Page.. 1174 ..

Mr Moore: I take a point of order, Mr Speaker. This is the very point of order that I raised. I refer to standing order 52, which reads:

A Member may not reflect upon any vote of the Assembly, except upon a motion that such vote be rescinded.

MR SPEAKER: Thank you.

Mr Moore: I am still continuing my point of order, Mr Speaker. You had indicated to Mr Hird that this was the case. Mr Speaker, you also have the option of standing order 202(e). If a member is persistently and wilfully disregarding the authority of the Chair he can be named, Mr Speaker. We have not done that for a long time. I think Mr Hird may be an excellent example.

MR SPEAKER: Perhaps you might bear it in mind yourself, Mr Moore.

MR HIRD: I do withdraw those remarks.

MR SPEAKER: Thank you, Mr Hird. Continue.

MR HIRD: The Chief Minister was merely using the correct channels to resolve a budget issue. Perhaps Mr Berry would care to enlighten the parliament on how many times his former colleague, the then Chief Minister, used her powers simply to transfer funds from one program to another to cover up a budget blow-out without reference to this house? What would have happened if Mrs Carnell had gone ahead with the transfer of those funds? She would have been subjected to the same criticism and condemnation because there would have been allegations from the Opposition benches that she was trying to hide something.

Mr Speaker, I believe that it is about time members of this house, particularly those on the other side of the house, stopped behaving like schoolkids and got on with the job of helping to govern this Territory. This is a classic case of the Chief Minister being damned if she does and damned if she does not. The Chief Minister and Treasurer, Mrs Carnell, has been subjected to attacks from the Opposition and, I am sorry to say, other members of this place for the professional way she has gone about this matter. She has been condemned for asking the parliament to pass an appropriation Bill seeking an additional $14.2m for the health budget - something that has blown out in every previous year. Mr Speaker, the Chief Minister could have shielded herself from these attacks by simply transferring the $14.2m from one program to another, as I said earlier. Unlike her predecessors, and those on the other side of this house, she preferred to be up front, say what the problem was, tell the house, and make it subject to public scrutiny - something that never happened in the life of the previous Government.

MS TUCKER (11.43): Mr Speaker, I also would like to thank Bill Symington and Kim Blackburn for their support to this committee, and the other members. Mr Speaker, the Greens also believe that Appropriation Bill (No. 2) was unnecessary and was undertaken largely as a political exercise in deflection. The Government knew that they were going to be seen as mismanaging the health budget, so the better political option was to say, "Yes, we blew out the health budget; but it is okay because we are not going to let anyone in the Health Department forget it, and we are much more open and transparent than the previous Government".

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