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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 1 Hansard (20 February) . . Page.. 281 ..

MS REILLY (continuing):

not listened to; where people do not feel they have been heard. I think it is of grave concern if people within the community cannot put up suggestions which criticise what the Government is doing. I think it is something we should guard against. I think it is important that we are having the discussion this afternoon and that we look towards having an open community that is actively working towards the best interests of the ACT.

MRS CARNELL (Chief Minister) (5.53): Mr Speaker, the sorts of comments that we have just heard from Ms Reilly, I think, are part of the problem, and we have to try to move to be part of the solution. The community groups that came to see me last week, after we actually talked it through, as Mr Humphries said, agreed that the level of consultation was actually very high. They did say that they believed there was some fear in the community. I then said, "What you have to do is tell us where. Is it coming from the political level?". They said, "No; it is not coming from the political level". I said, "Okay; it is not from that level. Where is it coming from?". They said, "There are some public servants who do this sort of thing". I said, "Fine. If you want us to fix it - and we want to fix it, too - you have to tell us where it is". Restating urban myth almost, I think, is what Ms Reilly just did. She could not actually tell us of any particular circumstances so that we could then go and counsel the people who are involved, assuming these statements are even half true.

Actually, the groups themselves said quite categorically that this was not coming from the political level. They said that the problem, as they saw it, was at the Public Service end. We said, "Fine; help us with this, because if there are some public servants who have the wrong approach to consultation we need to get out to them. We need to make sure that they change those views, that they actually understand that what they are there to do is get information from the community and feedback". In fact, my understanding is that Linda Webb as recently as just after that meeting last week has written to all the various areas in the ACT Public Service making the point, again, that we have to make sure that people who are involved in consultation with the community understand their responsibilities.

We have even put together a consultation protocol for all public servants who are involved in community consultation. I fully agree that, if there is any intimidation, or any of the rest of the things we have spoken about, happening between community groups and various parts of the Public Service, the first people who want to fix it are the Public Service and the Government. But I tell you what: Going around making allegations that are unsubstantiated about unnamed groups, unnamed public servants, unnamed consultation processes, helps nothing. In fact, it actually makes any perceived situation worse. I hope the new customer involvement unit, which will now be involved in speaking to those groups and identifying any particular areas where public servants involved in community consultation may not have got their protocols terribly right, will help.

This is something the Government takes enormously seriously. Maybe quantity does not equal quality. But I will tell you one thing: There is a lot of quantity out there. Our view is that we want the community input. We have focus groups. We have, as I said, 200 different consultations going on right now. We have quarterly reports on

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