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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 3 Hansard (10 April) . . Page.. 878 ..

MR STEFANIAK (continuing):

in particular, into ways and means by which parents can be assisted in their vital role of supporting their children in literacy development. The paper will examine the assessment regimes already in place and possible benchmarking processes and will look to the future to identify trends in literacy teaching and learning. I expect the paper to look at all the various literacy programs to suggest a more coordinated approach.

The draft paper, Improving Literacy in the ACT, will be released for public consultation in mid-1997, with a three-month consultancy period.

Ms McRae: You could have made a ministerial statement.

MR STEFANIAK: I have nearly finished, Ms McRae, if you would like to listen. Bear with me. I think even you would agree that this is a very important issue. The draft paper will be made available to the widest possible audience of interest, particularly parent, teacher, employer and post-secondary education interest groups. Following consultation, a final paper outlining the future directions on literacy teaching, learning and assessment will be considered by the Government before it is implemented.

MS McRAE: Mr Speaker, my question is to the Chief Minister. Chief Minister, I refer to an article that appeared in the Canberra Times after the last sittings and in which Mr Ray Alexander from the ACT Racing Club admitted that the Racing Club had been paying commissions and that they had stopped only after receiving your letter. Given that a payment of commissions constitutes a clear breach of the agency agreements between ACTTAB and the Racing Club, do you concede that the Racing Club's decision to cease payments after receiving your letter is an admission of guilt and that they were acting outside of the agency agreement?

MRS CARNELL: Ms McRae may not be aware that the ACT Racing Club is not a government agency, and I would not normally make a comment on the activities of a non-government entity.

MS McRAE: By way of supplementary question: Because it is an operating agency of the TAB, will you be referring the matter to the DPP or to the AFP to investigate the possibility of criminal conduct by the Racing Club in making secret payments to individual patrons?

MRS CARNELL: As I said, Mr Speaker, I wrote to the Racing Club suggesting to them - because they do not operate under Government direction at all - that this sort of approach is not appropriate. As I understand it, they are not engaging in that sort of behaviour.

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