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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 13 Hansard (2 December) . . Page.. 4270 ..

MRS CARNELL (continuing):

Just in the last couple of weeks, Mr Speaker, I was out at Tuggeranong opening the new indoor sports stadium, which is a joint venture between the Southern Cross Club, Basketball Canberra and the ACT Government. That involved significant dollars from the Southern Cross Club. A little while before that I was out at Conder opening a new playground that had been put there by the Tuggeranong Rugby Club. There are a number of other initiatives of that sort. We do have to weigh up the community benefit from allowing a monopoly to stay in place versus the potential revenue benefits to government of allowing an extension of poker machines. It will be an issue that I am sure this Assembly will address many times in the future.

MR MOORE: I have a supplementary question, Mr Speaker, to the Chief Minister. Knowing that the day before you were sworn in as Chief Minister the Licensed Clubs Association made a donation of $12,000 to the ACT Liberal Party and that a couple of days later they did the same for the Labor Party, how can you explain away the appearance that the policy protection that you have given to this lobby group is really about donations to a major political party?

MR SPEAKER: Order! Standing order 114 says that questions may be put to a Minister relating to public affairs with which that Minister is officially connected. I am not at all convinced, Mr Moore, that whatever money may be paid to a political party has any direct relationship to the Chief Minister.

Mr Moore: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: The issue that I am dealing with is how the Chief Minister handled this portfolio. It is appropriate that I ask her whether there is any outside influence. I have specified a particular possibility of an outside influence that has influenced the way she operates this part of her responsibilities. That is why I think the question is in order.

MR SPEAKER: I will allow that question as it seeks an explanation, Chief Minister, but do not stray into areas for which you do not have responsibility.

MRS CARNELL: Mr Speaker, I am happy to be quite categorical. I can guarantee that there is no influence by either the LCA or the AHA on ACT Liberal Party policy as a result of donations. Mr Moore may not be aware that I understand that the AHA is one of a very small group of single biggest contributors to the Federal Liberal Party. On that basis, Mr Speaker, we have two lots of conflict of interest that would tend to balance, if Mr Moore's approach was right. The reality here is that there is no input from donations that are made to political parties, certainly to the ACT. I do not know that you could go quite that far when you consider the huge amounts of money the Labor Party gets from poker machines, but I can guarantee that the AHA and the LCA both contribute quite heavily to the Liberal Party.

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