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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 13 Hansard (4 December) . . Page.. 4657 ..

MS McRAE (continuing):

I am using this adjournment debate to think out loud. I wonder whether the Minister could use this forum or make a ministerial statement next week to clarify the situation of that Bill and the relevance of the explanatory memorandum, both for our edification and for whoever uses Hansard and the proceedings of the parliament. I was really quite surprised to hear that the explanatory memorandums were not being taken seriously. I always believed that they were part of the proceedings and therefore an integral part of interpreting what we intended when something was passed in the Assembly. The consequences of it are reasonably serious. The process of redefining appeal rights involved putting in "adversely and substantially affected", but once you add the rights rather than interest it does narrow down the appeal rights of people.

Since the issue has come up again publicly a couple of times recently, I take this opportunity to put on record that perhaps we could find a way to reiterate what Mr Humphries did say in the explanatory memorandum and therefore strengthen the position of that explanatory memorandum vis-a-vis the legislation, and perhaps vis-a-vis all legislation. If it turns out that these explanatory memorandums do not have the status that I believe they have, perhaps we should be viewing what we do slightly differently. These are not issues I entirely understand, but they are issues of concern, and I raise them to have them clarified or perhaps acted on.

MR HUMPHRIES (Attorney-General and Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (7.48), in reply: Mr Speaker, first of all I will deal with the question of motor sport. Funnily enough, I have information about what happened in the Labor Party's ranks on this subject as well. I know that Mr Corbell got rolled in the party room on his view, as expressed in the Planning and Environment Committee, on the question of what to do about the noise from motor sport. Do not take my word for it. Look at the record. Mr Corbell went to the committee, came out of it trumpeting the five decibels above background noise as the solution for Fairbairn Park, and had to back down. I know that the people with responsibilities in the area of sport or other members of the Labor front bench said, "No, Simon; no, no, no. We cannot afford to knock off all those voting motor racing enthusiasts. Hang on, mate. We know you are enthusiastic about the environment, but there are other things to happen here". Mr Speaker, we all take different views to our party rooms. We would not be human beings if we did not have different views from time to time, would we? The fact of the matter is that neither major party can claim to have had consistent views about this matter from the very beginning, can we?

The other matter I wanted to deal with was the comment today by Ms Horodny about the fire danger and the removal of the total fire bans before the start of the Rally of Canberra. I have had some advice from the Chief Fire Control Officer and I want to read it into the record. It says this:

A total fire ban for the ACT was declared on the 26 November 97 for 24 hours from midnight Tuesday to midnight Wednesday. Due to a forecast of extreme bushfire danger for forest areas.

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