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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 1 Hansard (19 February) . . Page.. 93 ..

MR WHITECROSS (continuing):

They are unpalatable realities for the Government, but they are the truth. They have restricted choice, Mr Speaker. They have taken away options which people are entitled to have.

Mrs Carnell: You are just a fibber.

MR WHITECROSS: Mr Speaker, Mrs Carnell said I was a fibber. I think you should ask her to withdraw that.

Mrs Carnell: Thank you for putting it on the record. I am happy to withdraw anything he wants me to withdraw.

MR SPEAKER: Thank you.

MR WHITECROSS: Thank you. I am always happy to put on the record Mrs Carnell's strong logical arguments against my criticisms of her policy.

Mr Speaker, the fact is that people who live near town centres no longer have their local large supermarket to shop at after hours. They have to travel further to do their shopping, which means increased time spent on the roads and more cars on the roads - all the sorts of things that I would have thought the Greens, in particular, might have been concerned about. The trading hours policy relies on a bizarre variation of the trickle down theory to claim any benefits to local shops - that taking away one choice for customers will force people into the local shops against their will to do their shopping. The reality, Mr Speaker, is that customers will go to the shops they want to go to which are open, whether they are group centre supermarkets open at convenient times or town centre supermarkets open at inconvenient times. The Government has reduced hours at the very times that Canberrans prefer to do their shopping, and this is simply illogical. The Government has ignored the fact that people vote with their feet and that supermarkets open only if there is a demand. The reason town centre supermarkets opened the hours they opened was simple - people wanted to shop there.

The Liberal Government has ignored the fact that its own party organisation does not even think they have done a good job of explaining this policy. The Liberal Government has had numerous problems. They have had to pass the parcel over there with the policy. Mr De Domenico, the former Deputy Chief Minister, introduced the policy, and he was so embarrassed about it that he went off to Darwin and left Mr Humphries to take the running on it. Mr Humphries is the current Deputy Chief Minister, and he has been forced to take the running on it, even though it is a matter of business regulation and is outside his portfolio. Mrs Carnell, the Chief Minister, is now the Minister for Business and she can no longer hide behind her other Ministers. She has to take personal responsibility for this policy, and I urge her to fix it.

The Liberal Party organisation knows it is an unpopular and illogical policy. At the Liberal Party convention last year members of the Liberal Party sent a clear warning to this Government. The Liberal Party members gave the Carnell Government an escape hatch. Delegates at the convention said that they did not believe the Government did the work prior to introducing their policy. They were dismayed at the Liberal Government's pro-regulation, backward-looking policy.

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