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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 7 Hansard (25 June) . . Page.. 2070 ..

MS TUCKER (12.38): Just briefly, I will not be supporting this amendment by Mr Humphries. I made it clear in my speech that I was not happy with Labor's performance either, in terms of its acknowledgment of the value of the ABC and the funding cuts that they actually levied on the ABC. However, this is about now. This is a really critical situation, and I believe this amendment to Mr Corbell's motion actually is neutralising the motion to some degree. I really do not want that to happen, because right now we need to try to influence the Federal Government. This was a promise by the coalition. Mr Howard said quite clearly that he would not be touching the ABC. That was in March. In July, Senator Alston, the Minister for Communications and the Arts, announced the cuts and later announced the Mansfield review of the ABC. The fact that they have broken the promise is a scandal, and the way they are treating the ABC is an absolute scandal. We hear all the rhetoric about, "This obviously was not one of the core promises"; but it damn well should have been, because the ABC is core to accountability in Australia. We need to have a very strong force, especially right now, as I said before, with the challenges to media ownership in Australia.

MR MOORE (12.39): Ms Tucker's problem clearly is that she just does not understand the meaning of core promises. I will explain it for you, Ms Tucker, through you, Mr Speaker. It is quite clear that core promises are the ones that you are going to keep; they are the ones that advantage you. The ones that are non-core promises are the ones that are of no great advantage to you. I think that is an important point to understand about our Prime Minister and his Federal Liberal Party. The actions that they have taken on the media so far reflect such a great self-interest that they have to make sure that they very carefully distinguish between what is a core promise and what is not.

We have another excellent illustration of it in the way they are dealing with media ownership. The situation with media ownership ties in with this beautifully. You undermine the ABC, on the one hand; you look after your mates, on the other hand; and, before you know it, the media goes your way, and you have certainly improved your chances of winning the next election. I think the sorts of cuts that have been made to the ABC, by the Labor Government previously, but particularly by the Federal Liberal Government, are absolutely appalling. They are made so much more appalling and so much more galling by the fact that the Liberals promised people who were considering this as part of the issues in terms of voting - and it was an election issue that they were considering as they proceeded to vote - that there would be no cuts.

Mr Speaker, I do not think the ABC is perfect by any means. I have been a great supporter of the ABC and have stood up again and again to support the ABC; but, even in doing so, I have to tell you there are some things they do that drive me crazy. For example, they put on much too much sport, as far as I am concerned. They let cricket overrun the terrific programs - - -

Mr Stefaniak: I do not know about that, Mr Moore.

MR SPEAKER: Order!

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