Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 8 Hansard (27 June) . . Page.. 2387 ..

Mr Moore: Once you decide it is okay, it is okay and bugger everybody else?

MS TUCKER: No, there are other reports. There was a very good report, "Review of Trading Hours in the Australian Capital Territory", which we believed had very sound consultative processes. We also looked at that. We know that it is local, it is recent and it was thorough. We then came to the decision that we would be pleased to support this Liberal Government's proposal to introduce some regulation of trading hours in the most deregulated region in Australia. We were very pleased to see at least an attempt to establish some balance between the small business and big business sectors. Therefore, we are not at all concerned that we have not followed community consultation processes.

If you look at the motion, you will see the word "further". That is how we put the motion. We are looking at these other aspects so that we come up with some kind of broad vision of how in this society, in this region, we can have a balanced retail sector. We have listed quite clearly the various areas of concern that we want to look at. I find it rather hard to understand how Labor can be quite so holier than thou when this morning they were quite prepared to send down a moratorium on the expansion of retail space, although they knew already that this committee of inquiry was going to get up. They did not seem to see a huge problem then in the committee going straight ahead. We would not have had a moratorium but we would have been able to look at the provision of retail space. Labor would not support that. They just sat there and did their "no, we oppose on principle" act. That did not leave very much to say.

Mr Moore and Mr Osborne did not want a committee at all. It was extremely odd, because now that they have the committee they are suddenly saying, "This is a threat to the committee system. This is a bad precedent". We obviously are not of that view. We feel that there have been good consultative processes regarding the issue of trading hours. This is a very small step in that direction. We believe the evidence is there to support it. The consultation has occurred. This committee inquiry is to try to get a more strategic picture of where we need to go now to ensure that we have equity of access in this town; that we do not have huge ownership problems; that we have a town which people feel they can live in.

I believe this is a stunt tonight. We keep hearing "stunt, stunt". It is starting to sound like "grunt, grunt". It is monosyllabic. I will use that word now, though. This is a stunt. We have already had the discussions. You have pulled this out at the last minute. That is very stunt-like. I have to say that it has not worked at all. We feel quite comfortable with what was done here and we will support this legislation being debated now.

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .