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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 7 Hansard (30 June) . . Page.. 1810 ..
MR SMYTH (continuing):
out of the person involved. Ignore the facts, and certainly do not present any evidence". It is there in their manual, Mr Speaker. You know he is using the manual because when you do not have any evidence, what do you do? You simply turn up the volume.
What did we get? We got Mr Stanhope's speech. He was trying to present a case. What did we get from Mr Quinlan? Nothing. All he said was: "Let's turn up the heat. We'll turn up the volume. We can all talk much louder into our microphones and make it sound far more dangerous". But it is not. Forget the facts; speak loudly; therefore it must be true. But that is not the case. Opinion and obfuscation will beat evidence any time, according to the Labor Party. It is a sad state of affairs, Mr Speaker, when, as Mr Stefaniak quite clearly pointed out, Mr Quinlan said on 4 June, "I am sure the intention was not to commit an illegal act". He then went on to say, "We are not talking here about corruption". This motion of no confidence in the Chief Minister extends to all her Ministers because we hold our warrants from her; not from this place but from her as Chief Minister. There is no intent. There is no evidence. The Labor Party even admits there is no corruption, so why are we here?
When Mr Stanhope was off in the media making all kinds of outrageous accusations, he actually said that there had been an illegal act and it should be referred to the DPP. Well, why hasn't he done so? We all have the right to go to the DPP when we believe that there has been a crime, when we believe that there has been law-breaking. I do not believe that Mr Stanhope does, and I do not believe he will. It is quite clear, Mr Speaker, from what Mr Quinlan said, that he believed the Government thought it was acting within the terms of the Financial Management Act, and this is not surprising. Mr Quinlan had every right to assume that the Government's will was being carried out in accordance with the Financial Management Act, as did the Cabinet of the day.
Mr Speaker, it is quite appropriate to quote Jack Waterford here. Much has been made of the belief that the Chief Minister should know of every transaction that goes on, but Jack Waterford said this:
It would be beyond the wit of any mortal to be across the details of each individual piece of administration, in which, probably, several million decisions a day are made touching the rights or property of its citizens. Any such decision might be made routinely in an office ... by a clerk that the minister would never, in the course of ordinary business, be expected to see.
Mr Speaker, when the four members of Cabinet considered this matter in 1997 they did not believe that they were considering the possibility of an illegal act. Mr Kaine can correct me on this, but I am sure that that is his understanding of it as well. When both Mr Stanhope and Mr Quinlan get up here and impugn the integrity of those Ministers, what they are saying is that they set out to deliberately break the law. But, yet again, we get no idea of the intent. We get no hint of evidence. There is not a whiff of evidence in this debate, Mr Speaker.
Mr Speaker, the Chief Minister did not believe that she was acting contrary to the Financial Management Act. Not even the officers of the OFM believed that they were acting contrary to the Financial Management Act. Every party involved in this transaction believed that they were acting in good faith. There was simply no intention
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