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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 4 Hansard (24 June) . . Page.. 932 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

that we are not serious about trying to protect aspects of ACT industry or practices which are at risk under the new national competition policy. As has been made clear already, it is not a policy which this Government signed, but one which the former Labor Government signed and which we have been to some extent carried along with because of the implications of that decision back in 1994.

Mr Speaker, we would be happy to have the decisions we propose to take under those principles tested by an independent body. That is why we are prepared to support the amendment which has been put before the house. Mr Speaker, we have been told, in respect of this particular review that has been undertaken in respect of the Milk Authority, that it is clearly not independent enough for the liking of members of this place. Therefore, I would like to throw out a challenge to members here. Mr Speaker, I hope that everyone is listening to what I am about to say. Mr Speaker, members here claim that members of the ACT administration are not sufficiently independent to be able to conduct such a review. Let us assume, for argument's sake, that that is a sustainable argument. The Chief Minister has agreed with me that it is entirely appropriate for whatever answer that review comes up with to be tested independently by a consultant somewhere outside the Government, entirely outside the Government - some firm or body with a background or expertise in implementation of that policy.

Mr Speaker, I am perfectly happy for the Assembly to have a role in choosing who that independent consultant would be. The advice would be provided, not to the Government, but to the Assembly as a whole. (Extension of time granted) We have been told tonight in the course of this debate, I think rather insultingly, that the public servants who have developed an expertise in this area within the ACT government service are not sufficiently independent to be able to assess the question of the Milk Authority's future at arm's length and with sufficient empirical application of their own minds. Okay; we have been told that that cannot happen; that is fine. I put the challenge down to members in this place to let the review result be tested independently - not by a committee of the Assembly, which, with great respect, has a considerable amount of political overlay in its decision-making; but by independent consultants altogether, people with expertise on a day-to-day basis in the working of this area. If members are serious about the criticism they have made of this process, I invite them to take up the offer that we have made.

Members have said that we should do this through the Competition Policy Forum. Mr Speaker, I have grave reservations about that, and I will explain why. The reason I have grave reservations about it is the approach that has already been taken by the forum on this very issue, this issue of Milk Authority deregulation. I am advised that, some time ago, when the terms of reference for the review were being settled, the competition policy unit within the Government approached the committee through its chairman, Brian Acworth, to brief the committee on the proposals for review. It offered to do so. Some weeks later, the forum accepted an offer to have a presentation to that forum. Members of the unit arrived to brief the forum on what the proposals were. One member of the forum got up and left as soon as the Government's public servants arrived. It was fairly clear that there was considerable tension about the mere presence of those members of the competition policy unit at that meeting. Notwithstanding that, the very professional public servants who came to that meeting to brief those people conducted a full presentation to the meeting. At the end of the meeting, they offered

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