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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 7 Hansard (19 June) . . Page.. 1889 ..

MR WOOD (continuing):

Mrs Carnell went to the Health Department, and the officers said, "We found a mistake. We found a doubling up". Mr Berry, by interjection, I think, asked for the advice she got from the department. She was told that there was a doubling up, and no doubt there was some reason given for that. No doubt there was some comment made about how that could happen. Mrs Carnell has tried to cast a few dark aspersions about it, to indicate that there might have been some chicanery on the part of Mr Berry; but she has not developed it. Mr Berry, by interjection, said, "Table that advice you received". I would like to see that advice. I would like to see what the department said. I would like to know why there was a doubling up. I would like to know the full story from the department. The conversation that Mrs Carnell had with her department is something we ought to hear. Maybe in due course it will come out.

She received this piece of information, that there was a doubling of figures. In true Mrs Carnell style, she set out to make the most out of it. There was a bit of a kerfuffle in the department, she thought, "Let us make the most of this. Let us go full steam on this to attack Mr Berry". In true front-on, confrontational, knock them down style, which is the style of Mrs Carnell, she set out to maximise what she could get from this. That was the reason for the actions yesterday and the reason why it was important that this matter be debated today, despite the hesitancy of the Government.

There is the story. I do not think there is anything behind it. Maybe - very likely - there was a mistake in the department. Mr Berry never used that data - that is clear - when it could have been used to great political advantage. Subsequently, Mrs Carnell caught up with it and wanted to try to make something of it. It just does not wash. I think Mrs Carnell is the one who needs to be condemned for taking up the time of this Assembly and trying to make a mountain out of a molehill. As Mr Whitecross said, she should be down there, with hard administration, getting the shambles that is her administration back into some form of order.

MR DE DOMENICO (Minister for Urban Services) (12.48): Mr Speaker, the thing that I have noticed while sitting here listening to both sides of the debate is that Mr Wood, who made an interesting contribution to the debate, tends not to interject very often, expecting perhaps that when he rises to his feet he can be very calm and gentle and thereby win us over with his argument. But there is one flaw in the way Mr Wood operates - he forgets to look at the facts. The facts are quite simple. Mr Wood tried to convince us that Mrs Carnell is responsible for figures collated and published between November 1993 and December 1994. Mr Wood, as an ex-teacher, would use the word "logic". Logically, Mr Wood, how can Mrs Carnell be responsible when at the times the figures were collated and published she was not the Minister? It is impossible, logically, to blame Mrs Carnell. That is point No. 1.

Mr Wood: Was I talking about that?

MR DE DOMENICO: Yes, you were. The deceptive way in which members of the Opposition use the English language is fascinating. They said that it was a working document, having you believe that it was just scrawled out in illegible handwriting. The figures that we are talking about are typed and published. Under "1.2 Theatre Activity", we see the Woden Valley Hospital and ARS theatre activity. On the next page we see "Theatre Activity" again.

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