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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 11 Hansard (4 November) . . Page.. 3526 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

I am not saying that we cannot improve our systems in this Assembly. I am sure we can improve our systems. I am very happy to support a recommendation that the Chief Minister has at the moment to appoint a group of people, provided it is the right group of people, to look at and make recommendations - that is all they will do, make recommendations - on methods of improving the Assembly and the workings of the Assembly. It seems to me that we had a great opportunity to demonstrate, and we have demonstrated, to the people of Canberra that that is what happens in this Assembly. But, Mr Speaker, this is not the first time. It is actually the norm. This is the sort of thing that happens all the time. But where do we see reports of the cooperation between members of the Assembly? A huge amount of work has gone into ensuring that we deal with this legislation in the best possible way - straight-out hack work to get the best possible legislation that we can. Mr Speaker, I must say that on some television stations and radio stations this report was dealt with and some of them mentioned the cooperative approach of the committee.

I would like to thank Mr Humphries for his acknowledgment of the work of the committee. Finally, I want to refer to my colleagues on the committee. It was the first time I have worked on a committee with Mr Corbell and I think he made a terrific contribution, along with Ms Horodny and Mrs Littlewood, who work with me very regularly on committees. I am conscious of the contribution that they always make. There are many occasions when our Assembly works in a much more cooperative way than probably any other parliament in Australia, and probably in a much more cooperative way than almost any other parliament in the Commonwealth. Yet we still have the finger pointed at us. In fact, I have a recent letter saying that all we ever do is bitch. I think it is unfortunate that these cooperative efforts are not given appropriate space in the media.

MR CORBELL (12.38), by leave: To respond to Mr Moore's comments, it was in the Canberra Times, Mr Moore. Far be it from me to defend the Canberra Times, but it was there. There were about two very small paragraphs in Saturday's or Monday's paper at about page 13 or 15 - something like that. I stand, albeit reluctantly, to defend the Canberra Times on this.

MR MOORE: Mr Speaker, I need to make a personal explanation under standing order 46.

MR SPEAKER: Yes.

MR MOORE: Obviously, Mr Speaker, I withdraw any of the imputation that may have been inappropriate.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

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