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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 5 Hansard (6 May) . . Page.. 1446 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

compensation, "Discussion Paper - Reform of the Australian Capital Territory Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme". It was released to the public on 6 June 1997, more than a month before the implosion. Are we supposed to have known that we were going to maim people all over Canberra in this implosion, so we quickly got out these reforms so that we could make sure that they could not claim money when it came to mopping up after the implosion? It is just so bizarre, Mr Speaker.

What is even more bizarre, in my view, is that the conspiracy theories to which Mr Collaery is, as we all know, so deeply addicted, have actually caught up members of this place who ought to know better. Mr Berry and Mr Wood have served in this place with that person and they have made some pretty explicit statements about Mr Collaery in their time.

Mr Wood: I beg your pardon.

MR HUMPHRIES: I do not know whether Mr Wood has. He has made them in private, but he might not have made them publicly. Okay. But Mr Berry is on the record as saying some pretty scathing things about Mr Collaery, both in this place and outside it. Mr Speaker, as I said, I have no hesitation in predicting precisely what tone members would adopt if they had been asked before today whether they thought that Mr Collaery would make anyone a particularly good solicitor in any particular matter.

Mr Speaker, the third issue that has been raised, not counting the so-called visit by X and Y, is the matter of amendments to the Occupational Health and Safety Act. That issue has been extensively canvassed already on the floor of this place. I have put my case here emphatically before and I do not intend to go back over that in the course of today. I have already made my claim on that matter very clearly. The Government did not support the retrospective legislation to remove people's rights in that matter and it still does not. The Government's position on that has been perfectly clear. To censure the Government, or me in particular as Attorney-General, for refusing to take a position which we believed then and believe now to be reprehensible would be a travesty, Mr Speaker. I disagree strongly with members of this place about a whole range of things, but I would not ever move to censure them or move no confidence in them on the basis that they had refused to act in accordance with a different point of view from the one in which they genuinely believed, assuming that it was not in conflict with their duties of office, and I maintain that this case is not an example of that.

Mr Speaker, I do not believe that there is much more to be said about this matter. There are two small things I might say. First of all, Mr Stanhope made reference to X being a member of my personal staff. I think for the record that it ought to be clear that the position that she holds in my office is not as a member of my personal staff. You may be aware that there are two sorts of staff in a Minister's office: There are personal staff and there are departmental staff. She is not a member of my personal staff.

Mr Moore: He should know that.

MR HUMPHRIES: He should know that. There are lots of things that he should know about this issue but does not.

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