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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 13 Hansard (3 December) . . Page.. 4446 ..

MR SPEAKER: Mr Berry, you are suspended from the service of the Assembly for two sitting days.

Mr Berry accordingly withdrew from the chamber.

MR SPEAKER: Mr Kaine, were you in the middle of an answer, or had you finished?

MR KAINE: I think I had fully answered that question, Mr Speaker.

Mr Whitecross: Mr Speaker, I seek leave of the house to move a motion of dissent from your ruling.

MR SPEAKER: It is not a ruling; I have been advised by the Clerk that it is a vote of the Assembly. Mrs Littlewood, do you have a supplementary question?

MRS LITTLEWOOD: Of course, to the Minister for Tourism. What would occur if the bed tax, as suggested by the Labor Party, was brought in by the Labor government?

MR KAINE: That is an interesting question, and it is one that I have thought about often lately because - - -

Mr Moore: On a point of order, Mr Speaker: I do believe the question is speculation.

MR SPEAKER: I uphold the point of order.

MR KAINE: It is not a matter of speculation at all, actually. The consequences are quite real because there is plenty of - - -

MR SPEAKER: You may address the consequences but not necessarily the speculation.

MR KAINE: From what has been said by the Labor spokesman on tourism, we can be pretty confident that they are intending to bring in a bed tax. That is the reason why it is an interesting question and that is the reason why I have given it some considerable thought lately. If you have listened carefully to Mr Corbell in recent times, he has been talking about all sorts of significant increases in expenditure that he is going to put into effect in tourism after February, if they happen to be elected to government. Only in the last few days he talked about injecting an extra million dollars into the tourism marketing budget. I know how hard it is to get a million dollars for the tourism marketing budget - - -

Mrs Carnell: He certainly does.

MR KAINE: - - - and he is going to be getting it from somewhere outside - - -

Ms McRae: Mr Speaker, did you hear Mrs Carnell interject? I thought interjections were entirely out of order. May I just point this out to you.

MR SPEAKER: I would be very careful, Ms McRae. I am quite capable of suspending somebody else here very shortly.

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