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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 8 Hansard (27 August) . . Page.. 2502 ..

Mr Humphries: You have been responsible for most of it, Wayne, so you can hardly complain about it, can you?

MR BERRY: I am in no way responsible for this, Mr Humphries. What I am saying to you is that I am not satisfied that it should proceed. I need to be convinced that it should proceed. If you decide to ram it through, I will be critical of the Government for these sorts of experiments, and I will be critical of Mr Moore for these sorts of experiments - but experiments are things that seem to be part of a way of life with him. I will be opposing the in-principle stage. If Mr Moore and his Liberal friends and the Greens have decided to ram this through, then they will ram it through and it will become the law of the Territory; but they will not be getting support from the Labor Party at this stage.

Motion (by Mr Wood) put:

That the debate be adjourned.

The Assembly voted -

	AYES, 6	 	NOES, 11

	Mr Berry	Mrs Carnell
	Mr Corbell	Mr Cornwell
	Ms McRae	Mr Hird
	Ms Reilly	Ms Horodny
	Mr Whitecross	Mr Humphries
	Mr Wood		Mr Kaine
			Mrs Littlewood
			Mr Moore
			Mr Osborne
			Mr Stefaniak
			Ms Tucker

MR MOORE (11.58), in reply: In rising to thank members for their general support, I recognise that the support is for changing the time of elections to October, rather than changing to four-year terms, and recognise that the members who have indicated support have indicated that they are not supporting four-year terms but the retention of three-year terms other than in the lead-up to the first October election, consistent with the Electoral Commissioner's recommendations. Mr Berry and Mr Whitecross said that we ought to adjourn this debate. Had I tabled this legislation a month ago and sought to bring it on now, then people may well have said, "Mr Moore, I think that that is pushing it too hard"; but the reality is that this legislation was tabled in November last year and brought on for debate in December. Members ought to have been ready in December. At that point members might have rightly said, and did say, "We are really not ready to debate this. We think there are some broader issues. We think the legislation should be exposed to some public debate". Indeed, it was.

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