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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1998 Week 10 Hansard (25 November) . . Page.. 3027 ..

MR HARGREAVES (continuing):

end up with an imbalance. Mr Speaker, it is my preference that the predominance of the membership of the advisory panel be women, to bring that woman's perspective. However, being pragmatic, I recognise that that may be unpalatable to some of the people here.

It has been a feature of this debate that we have been accused of being 15 men making decisions about women's lives. I think it is only fair, therefore, that we make sure that the legislation embodies the imperative that a significant number of women participate in the development of the information to be distributed to members of their own sex. I would hope that this amendment would pass without reduction. In fact, I would welcome an amendment to increase it.

MR OSBORNE (2.49 am): Mr Speaker, I have no problems with that. I would not mind if there were seven women on the panel. I would leave that up to the board. The only issue that I think is of some concern is that perhaps there needs to be some sort of deal between the two boards - they may want to appoint only three - as to who is going to appoint two and who is going to appoint one. Maybe that is something that the Minister can facilitate. If they decide that they want to amend it, one of them is going to have to appoint two and the other is going to have to appoint one, but I think the Minister said that he does not feel that that is going to be a problem. I will be supporting Mr Hargreaves.

Amendment (Mr Hargreaves') to Mr Moore's amendment, agreed to.

MR OSBORNE (2.50 am): Mr Speaker, I move:

Proposed new subclause (4), omit "regular intervals", substitute "weeks 2, 4, 6, 12, 18 and 22".

I believe that this is an agreed amendment to the issue of the regular intervals for the pictures which we spoke about earlier. In negotiations, I came up with the spacing. In the original Bill, we initially wanted pictures and photos every two weeks, which would have made it like a novel, I suppose. So we have come up with the timeframe of pictures at two weeks, four weeks, eight weeks, 12 weeks, 18 weeks and 22 weeks, which I do not think is too onerous, Mr Speaker. The amendment is in line with what I said earlier, that the pictures and the information are crucial to this piece of legislation.

MR STANHOPE (Leader of the Opposition) (2.51 am): I would just like to say that I do not support the amendment, Mr Speaker.

MS TUCKER (2.51 am): I would like to say as well that I do not support it. It is so offensive that I cannot bear to think about it.

MR BERRY (2.51 am): I can still bear to think about it, because it drives me nuts. To see those patronising efforts under way again just appals me. You run out of adjectives to describe the madness of some of these ideas. It is bad enough if it has got "regular intervals". It is a mad piece of legislation in any event. But we are trying to

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