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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 5 Hansard (25 August) . . Page.. 1231 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

Mr Speaker, I think the Assembly, and particularly the Justice and Community Safety Committee, demands or deserves an explanation for this. Unless both Mr Keenan and Mr Murtagh are lying - I have to say that I find that prospect to be unlikely - Mr Hargreaves should explain to the Assembly why he has made those statements which contradict the statements made both in the media and to the JACS Committee, the information that I have here that I have placed before this place.

Mr Speaker, we are considering at the moment a motion of censure of Ministers for misleading. I ask members on that side of the chamber to ask themselves what sort of standard they are setting for themselves, and whether it is the same as the standard being set for members on this side of the chamber.

Mr Berry: Mr Speaker, I take a point of order. The Minister is anticipating debate.

MR SPEAKER: There is no point of order.

MR QUINLAN: My question is to the Chief Minister in her role as Treasurer and it relates to the PKF consulting scoping study on ACTTAB. There was a range of values mentioned in that report. The values ranged from $14m through to about $42m. Will you concede that at $42m there would be a return on capital of something like 4 per cent, all other things being equal, and therefore that is not a realistic number at all? Could you let us know whether there is any indicative reserve price on the enterprise? Is there any reason yet to reach the light of public gaze that would encourage any entrepreneur or enterprise to pay anything more than $14m for ACTTAB?

MS CARNELL: Thank you, Mr Quinlan, for the question because it again shows an absolute lack of understanding of what the Government is doing in this case. As everybody, apart obviously from those opposite, is aware, TABs right around Australia have either been sold, are on the market, or governments are looking at putting them on the market any minute. Why would this be so, Mr Speaker? Why would the New South Wales Labor Government sell their TAB? There is absolutely deathly silence from those opposite.

Mr Kaine: To make a quick quid?

MS CARNELL: Well, that could be right. A quick quid indicates, Mr Kaine, that there must be buyers out there, does it not? There must be people out there who are interested in investing in TABs generally. The fact is that a number of people have indicated that they are interested in our TAB. In the scoping study one particular consortium made their interest known in writing.

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