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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 5 Hansard (26 August) . . Page.. 1375 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

People are coming to the Minister's office and to my office with complaints about their lack of capacity to be appropriately dealt with through the public health system. But the Minister has the time to develop a private members program of this depth and intensity, and he intends to run a significant private members program. I do not know when. I do not know on which day he intends to run this program.

Mr Berry: In Executive business.

MR STANHOPE: Yes, it must be under Executive business. It highlights some of the serious problems we have with Mr Moore.

Mr Moore: I requested that it be done under private members business. You heard me say it.

MR STANHOPE: We will have serious concerns about a Minister with ministerial resources, with departmental liaison officers and all the other resources available to you in your office, Mr Moore, seeking to compete with genuine private members business. It will be completely unacceptable to the Opposition. The fact that you are intent on using as a measure of productivity and work rate in this place the number of Bills introduced is just simply spurious. It is a spurious measure that you are imposing on the Assembly. To suggest that because you, the great, mighty Michael Moore, introduced more legislation in the last Assembly you outworked the entire Opposition is a load of absolute nonsense. If the challenge you are throwing down is that you want to compete with the rest of the Assembly on the number of pieces of legislation that we introduce, then I would ask you as a Minister to give up portion of the draftsman's time available to you. Where are you going to give it up from? Where is the time going to come from? You want to engage us in a war on the number of pieces of legislation introduced as a measure of output. Are you, as a Minister, going to give up some of the drafting time available to you? I have drafting instructions in now that I cannot have dealt with because of the pressure of government business. What business are you going to give up as a Minister to allow me to get my legislation drafted?

You raise more questions than you answer in relation to this, Mr Moore. You, as the Minister for Health, are in one of the most important portfolio areas in the ACT, an area that is not coping very well. The public health system is under extreme pressure. It is a public health system that allows people with hepatitis C and infected blood to go unnotified for four years. I think, Minister, you should be devoting your attention to your portfolio responsibilities. The fact that you are allowing yourself to be diverted in this way, in some sort of petty attempt at upstaging the rest of the Assembly, is not very engaging. It is not very edifying. It causes me great concern that you, as the Minister for Health, think you have that latitude.

Ms Carnell: Mr Speaker, I seek leave to make a statement also.

MR SPEAKER: Is leave granted?

Mr Berry: No, we have had enough.

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