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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 5 Hansard (13 May) . . Page.. 1329 ..

MRS CARNELL (continuing):

The second part of the motion is about misleading the community and the Assembly on this matter. Again, I do not believe that the Minister has done that. We do have an Ombudsman's report at the moment that this Government will obviously respond to. Mr Kaine was very eloquent in his comments about Ombudsman's reports. If there should be a censure motion every time an ombudsman brought down a report that was critical in some way of the Government or the Government's action in a particular area or the Government's administration or the way the Government handled things, then we would have to have a censure motion on every single ombudsman's report. The role of the Ombudsman is to bring forward areas where, as a government, we could improve administration. If every time there are problems with the Housing Trust, with the police or with Health and Community Care - Mr Berry will know, because there were a number of ombudsman's reports that were not terribly positive about some of the approaches in health when he was Health Minister - we should go down a path - - -

Mr Berry: How many?

MRS CARNELL: I do not know. Do you? The ombudsman's reports bring forward situations where we could improve as governments. Governments take those reports on board wherever possible and make the appropriate administrative changes. That is what will happen here. I know that the Minister himself will take the report of the Ombudsman very seriously. On that basis, any thought that the Minister somehow misled the community or the Assembly is simply wrong.

I think this is a silly censure motion. It is an issue that has been debated many times in this Assembly. The numbers in the Assembly have been such that the School Without Walls has been closed at its current site and relocated to a new site. A new facility is up and running, and is up and running well. This is just an effort by some people in this Assembly to make political points.

MR BERRY (5.36): Censure motions are fairly serious things and ought to be taken seriously. So, too, should the right of individuals and members in this place to be able to consider all aspects in relation to this matter. I note that the Government and Mr Moore have refused the option for the Opposition to consider this matter further. After all, today is the first time it has been discussed in this place, and I think it would have been fair enough for the Opposition to have had a bit more time to consider the issue, given the seriousness of the issue at hand.

The motion moved in the Assembly to censure the Minister talks about "his handling of the consultation and review process about the future of the School Without Walls". On Mr Stefaniak's record, I have some sympathy with that particular view. We had an experience with Mr Stefaniak where he said to the community in Charnwood that he would not close their school, unless they agreed. They did not agree and he closed it. He misled them too. We have had an experience with Mr Stefaniak when it comes to dealing with the community. We know that he will mislead them, as he did one time before, in our experience. I have a great deal of sympathy with the move to censure Mr Stefaniak over his handling of the consultation and review process. I have seen him at work before, and it is not a pretty sight. On that score I think there is an argument to censure Mr Stefaniak.

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