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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 1 Hansard (18 February) . . Page.. 3 ..

INAUGURAL SPEECH

MR CORBELL (11.12): Mr Speaker, I ask for leave of the Assembly to make my inaugural speech.

Leave granted.

MR SPEAKER: Before I call Mr Corbell, I wish to remind members that this is the member's inaugural speech and it is traditional that it be heard in silence.

MR CORBELL: Mr Speaker, as I stand in this Assembly today I am conscious of a significant responsibility and a great opportunity. Over the past months since my election I have been acutely aware of the expectations that rest upon me to truly represent the interests and concerns of people living in the Molonglo electorate. I am grateful already for the very positive support I have received from a wide range of community groups and individuals across Canberra, and I am looking forward to building and strengthening the valuable contacts I have already made.

I also want to give thanks to the many people in the Labor Party who have expressed great optimism and confidence in my capacity to take on this role and who have welcomed my election. I hope to be able to repay their support in the coming year. Most importantly, I wish to thank my partner, Nelida Contreras, for her unqualified support and encouragement in this dramatic change of vocation for me. Her unending patience and love I will always value. I also want to thank all of my family who are here - Brenda, Trevor, Trish, Lloyd and Bec - as well as Nelly, Ramon, Tess and Peter, who cannot be here today. All of your advice and encouragement means a great deal to me.

Mr Speaker, the opportunity provided to me to sit in this Assembly is one I chose to accept because I believe I am capable of continuing the dedicated and principled work of Rosemary Follett, whose seat in this chamber I now occupy. I will be striving to fulfil this opportunity, and the expectations which accompany it, with all of my energy and commitment. There is much which needs to be addressed with energy and commitment in Canberra. Canberra is changing, but much of this change is not welcomed by those who live here. Unless you wield influence or are wealthy or privileged you will find that the very nature of the Canberra community is being fundamentally changed. The influence of the ideology of economic rationalism is dramatically changing our city. The belief that all must be measured by its monetary value, by what it can be bought or sold for, rather than by what it achieves or contributes, is undermining our sense of society. We are told by governments that we are no longer citizens but consumers, that our place in society is measured only by our ability to buy or sell.

The promise of economic rationalism has been that by adapting to the realities of the market we are building a more secure and more realistic society. This promise has been made in Canberra, as it has been elsewhere around Australia. Yet ask any Canberran whether their life has become more secure or less secure in the past decade, and they will tell you it is less secure. The promise of pain for long-term gain is a false one. Services are declining, not improving; the sense of community is being broken down, not built up; and the prospect of finding a more secure income is less likely, not more so.

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