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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 12 Hansard (24 November) . . Page.. 3604 ..

Mr Quinlan: I think we have got room to move in this one, Gary. I think we have got plenty of room to move.

MR HUMPHRIES: I am sure there is plenty of room to move on this test, Mr Quinlan, and I am sure you will make sure it moves as the case arises, but we are entitled to expect some kind of definition of ministerial accountability which will endure beyond today's debate. So what is the test? Tell us what the test is. If you cannot articulate that test in this debate today then the motion must fail, because all you are doing otherwise is using this as a vehicle to produce a result that suits you in this particular circumstance. (Further extension of time granted)

Mr Speaker, I want to correct a couple of misstatements made by a couple of people. Ms Tucker applied the test very well. She articulated the test quite perfectly, I would have thought, quoting from the same section of House of Representatives Practice that I have just quoted from, with reference to things like action taken by Ministers or things done at their direction and so on, but then went on, with great respect, to completely misapply the facts of this particular case. Ms Tucker tried to read into the document where we might assume the Chief Minister must have given some direction for certain things to happen.

The problem is that the coroner actually examined this issue. You do not have to read things into it. The coroner addressed this issue in his report and said that at the end of the day there was no evidence that the Chief Minister was involved in personally directing that these things happened in this way. There is no evidence that these are things that she ought directly to have been concerned with, such as to give rise to personal criticism of her. So Ms Tucker used the right test, but applied the facts, with respect, completely at odds with the way in which the coroner has applied it.

Mr Quinlan said in his remarks that all the people who were at risk on 13 July 1997 were placed at risk because of poor administration. Mr Speaker, again, that is not what the coroner has found. On page 621 of his findings he summarises the conclusion, and I quote:

Then he refers to five different bases for that systemic failure. Only one or perhaps two of those items could be described as poor administration. The first thing that the coroner mentions is:

He criticised those people and, moreover, he has committed them for trial for their mistakes, for the errors, as he sees them. Next:

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