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

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 3 Hansard (9 April) . . Page.. 758 ..

MRS CARNELL (continuing):

Mr Speaker, this is an important issue. Gaming machines and gambling are an important issue for the community generally. I think that when we have debates in this place there must be no indication whatsoever, or no view that the community could have, that that debate in tainted in any way by a conflict of interest that might exist for anybody on the floor of this house. The debates must be handled in a way that is above any of those sorts of innuendos that might exist, or any perceptions that could exist. I think, Mr Speaker, that $604,000 is an awful lot of perception.

MR WHITECROSS (Leader of the Opposition) (11.55): Well, well, well; Mrs Carnell has risen to the bait, Mr Speaker, and has decided to put her money where her mouth is on this issue.

MR SPEAKER: She actually just sat down from debate.

MR WHITECROSS: Mr Speaker, she has finally decided that she has to put her money where her mouth is and come out and justify this smear campaign that she and Mr Moore have been conducting against the Labor Party in order to try to preclude us from the debates on gambling and in order to procure for themselves some political advantage. We welcome the opportunity to have this debate, Mr Speaker, but I think Mrs Carnell and her colleagues are going to regret ever raising this issue, because the principle that they are establishing is a principle they will not be able to live with. It is a principle they will not be able to live by.

It is all very well, Mr Speaker, for Michael Moore to buy into the issue of conflict of interest because you have received a donation from a political party. Michael Moore can buy into that to his heart's content because he does not get any. So he is happy to establish a principle which says, "No-one likes me enough to give me a political donation, so I do not think anyone else should get one, and I do not think you should vote on anything involving an organisation from which you get a political donation". Michael Moore does not have a problem. He has a position which I do not agree with. He has a position for his motivations I question; but, Mr Speaker, he has a position he can live with, but you cannot and the Government cannot.

This is a position the Government cannot live with. It is a position which, if it pursues it, it will regret. If it wishes to pursue the principle that members in this place cannot vote on issues where interest coincides with the interests of contributors to their political campaigns, it will have to abide by that rule itself. Let me assure you that it is not a rule that you are going to enjoy abiding by. You all ought to think very carefully about this hole that Mrs Carnell has dug for you. You all ought to think very carefully about whether you want to go down this track. You know that at the end of the day, Mr Speaker, an argument about conflict of interest in relation to political donations is an argument you cannot live with.

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