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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 6 Hansard (17 June) . . Page.. 1632 ..

Mrs Carnell: Or to have on their agenda motions to get rid of all senior public servants.

MR KAINE: Exactly. As a matter of practice, as a Minister, I have been very careful to avoid doing or saying anything that would infer that I am involved or should be involved in matters that are rightly the problems of the Public Service. If members of the Opposition have any concerns about something that is going on in the Department of Urban Services, let me assure them that it is not political. Of course, they are pretty good at this. They threw this up recently when Mr Flutter was leaving ACTION. Not only did they, in conjunction with the trade unions, embark on a destabilisation campaign against Mr Flutter but also they attempted to do it against Mr Flutter's deputy.

So we have here, Mr Speaker, a bad case of the pot calling the kettle black. I am not involved, nor will I become involved, in matters affecting the career progression of public servants, senior or junior. As I challenged the Opposition to do when they were destabilising John Flutter, if they have any evidence to suggest that something untoward is going on, would they provide it to me and then they can reasonably expect an answer. But they had better be very specific about their accusations as it may just bounce back on them, Mr Speaker, because I do not intend to politicise the Public Service, unlike the noisy Opposition opposite.

MR SPEAKER: Do you have a supplementary question, Mr Whitecross?

MR WHITECROSS: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Minister, is this not another case, hot on the heels of the forced resignation of the ACTION CEO, John Flutter, of the environment of fear and intimidation that ACT public servants are forced to work in under your Government? Are you not concerned about that, Minister? Are you not concerned that these rumours appear in the media and then, within days sometimes, they turn out to be true?

MR SPEAKER: Order! It seeks an expression of opinion.

MR KAINE: Mr Speaker, there are at least three questions in there. Could you ask the Leader of the Opposition to be specific about which question he wants me to answer? It is a supplementary question, Mr Speaker.

MR SPEAKER: No; because they all asked for an expression of opinion.

MR HIRD: My question is to the Chief Minister. Could the Chief Minister inform the parliament of the guidelines for the ACT Government's business incentive scheme, following the claims of the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Whitecross, on the weekend that the Government is interested only in attracting interstate businesses to Canberra?

MRS CARNELL: Thank you very much, Mr Hird. Mr Speaker, I do not know what they put in the coffee - assuming they had coffee - at the Labor Party conference over the weekend, but it must have been pretty good stuff. Maybe Mr Moore could have helped.

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