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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 11 Hansard (4 November) . . Page.. 3562 ..

MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: There is no motion - - -

MRS CARNELL: No. If what he said - - -

MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mrs Carnell, there are no ifs and buts.

Mr Berry: Come on; just withdraw.

MRS CARNELL: I withdraw. Madam Deputy Speaker, if what Mr Berry said was that the legislation was not agreed to at these meetings that Rosemary Follett signed off on, then he is wrong, because the agreement to enter into the legislation was actually part of those meetings and those agreements. I did not disagree with those agreements. I did not disagree with that approach that Rosemary Follett took. I totally agree with that. Mr Berry says, somehow, that this approach is predominantly from me or my Government. Rosemary Follett entered into 11 agreements with regard to competition policy, in gas, water and electricity; I have entered into three, one in each. All of those issues were signed off.

The agreements to enter into model legislation were signed and agreed to under the previous Government. I agree with it. I think it is a good way to go. But Mr Berry cannot now distance himself from it. He was Deputy Chief Minister when these agreements were entered into. You simply cannot be that hypocritical. You have to accept that, if 11 of these agreements were signed off by Rosemary Follett, and three by us, you cannot then say, "They have nothing to do with me. It was not me". The fact is that it was.

Mr Moore: And he was Deputy Chief Minister.

MRS CARNELL: He was Deputy Chief Minister.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

MR HUMPHRIES (Attorney-General): I ask for leave of the Assembly to make a ministerial statement on the firearms buyback in the ACT.

Leave granted.

MR HUMPHRIES: I thank members. I am pleased to report to members on the outcome of the buyback of prohibited firearms in the ACT. As it turns out, Madam Deputy Speaker, this is a quite timely ministerial statement, because this is actually also about a national agreement - a national agreement that was reached in May of last year, a national agreement that occurred with very little - in fact, no - consultation with members of the Assembly, but which, I am pleased to say, was followed immediately it was reached by the unanimous support of the Assembly in banning an agreed range of semiautomatic firearms by introducing amendments to the Weapons Act 1991.

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