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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 12 Hansard (20 November) . . Page.. 3837 ..

MS FOLLETT (continuing):

Most recently, of course, I think members will know Mr Pye because of his involvement in, or in fact his initiation of, the print handicapped radio station. Most of us will have visited the little radio studio on the Barton Highway and been interviewed by Bill Pye, probably at considerable length, probably in an extremely interesting exchange of views and probably to an exceptionally small audience. Nevertheless, I think the fact that Mr Pye picked up a need for a radio station dedicated to people who had difficulty with the print media and to people who may have been sight impaired, for instance, and actually set about, with his usual energy and his usual vivacity, setting up that radio station, keeping it going and making sure that there were interesting and lively debates going over the airwaves to his audience is a further tribute to his commitment to his own community.

Mr Pye had a very long and very productive life - a life which enriched the community that he lived in and particularly enriched people who were somewhat disadvantaged within that community. On behalf of the Opposition, I extend our condolences to his widow, his children and his grandchildren. I know how blessed Mr Pye felt by his family and I know that they will be missing him greatly. Nevertheless, they can be very proud of his achievements, the affection for him and the very real contribution that existed around him, and still does, in his own community. I think his family would be the first to say that he was a wonderful man. I am sure they will now be comforted by the fact that so many in the community share that view.

MR MOORE: Mr Speaker, I rise to support this motion and extend our condolences to Bill Pye's family. I heard Rosemary Follett talking about his breadth of interests. Anybody who served in this Assembly for any time would certainly be aware of the breadth of Mr Pye's interests. He was very forthright in his views and had no difficulty in picking up the telephone or stopping us in the street to share those views with us. There were many occasions on which I disagreed with him, but it was always a very frank and open discussion and one in which he always had particularly good reasons behind what he was arguing. In a democratic process that is very important. It was an important thing that Bill Pye understood.

I also had the pleasure of being interviewed by Bill Pye on print handicapped radio. To a certain extent, it was one of those ambushes that he was particularly good at, as Ms Follett said. It was probably a very small audience. He had me caught out on the back foot from very early in the piece and then gave me room and time to explain what my perspective was and why I was doing what I was doing. I think it is a great credit to him that he could use that sort of forum to bring out from somebody who was in a responsible position a full explanation of what they were doing and why they were doing it. I think too often in the media in the present day that is something that is missed. The short grab, an interview that works for two or three minutes, because that is what the media believe is the people's attention span, is favoured. It is a very difficult medium in which to deal with really complex issues.

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