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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 7 Hansard (23 September) . . Page.. 2106 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

I can see how this debate is going to go, and I am sorry that my motion has been amended. I hope that we do see support for Mr Hargreaves's motion so that we can at least ensure that the basic industrial processes are respected by this Government and that the Government pull back from their ideologically driven pursuit of privatisation.

Motion, as amended, agreed to.

ACTION - TENDER PROCESS

MR SPEAKER: Mr Hargreaves, you have to formally move your motion.

MR HARGREAVES (4.23): Mr Speaker, I move:

That this Assembly:

(1) noting that:

(a) public transport is a basic essential service providing equal access to all in the community;

(b) in relation to public assets, bottom line financial results are not the sole determinant of successful performance of its function;

(2) calls on the Government to recognise its community service obligations in the provision of public transport services;

(3) requires the Government to adopt proper industrial relations philosophies, dropping the inappropriate comparisons between the negotiated settlement with the Transport Workers Union and the collected expressions of interest in managing ACTION, resulting in the Government's public invitation for such expressions; and

(4) further requires the Government to cease any further tender/expression of interest evaluations until such time as the proper industrial relations process has been completed.

MR SPEAKER: Thank you. Now you may close the debate, Mr Hargreaves.

MR HARGREAVES (4.24), in reply: We have been here for a fair while talking about this so I am not going to take very much time. I will just run over a few major issues. The Chief Minister once said that it is not the Government's job to provide services. Now I can see that that sort of thing is coming true. What this motion is trying to do is to get all of us in the Assembly, not just the Government but all of us, to acknowledge that we have a public transport obligation - not a private one, not a for-profit one, but a public one. It is the other end of the stick that we have to look after, the disadvantaged people, elderly people and schoolkids.

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