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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 12 Hansard (24 November) . . Page.. 3612 ..
MR KAINE (continuing):
It was beyond question that Mr Kaine played no part in the direction of this project.
Elsewhere in the main body of his report, at page 452, the coroner expands on his findings about my supposed involvement in the hospital demolition. At paragraph 118, he says:
There is no doubt that the absence of Mr Kaine from the project was an extraordinary occurrence.
That is true. He continues:
The truth of the matter is that he took no particular role in the management of the project. Mrs Carnell, Mr Wearing and Mr Walker asserted that the project in fact was a responsibility of Mr Kaine, but for the reasons previously stated these persons are mistaken on this issue. At all material times it was a CMD project. Mrs Kate Carnell was the Minister accepting responsibility at a Territory level for the project as the Chief Minister.
That gives the lie to the latest accusations by the Chief Minister and the continuing accusations by her and her deputy that I was responsible. Curiously, in his executive summary, the coroner adds as a footnote:
I do not accept the proposition that Mr Kaine was shut out of the project. The evidence seems to me that he was always at liberty to communicate and place his views to the Chief Minister. Mr Kaine did not give evidence to the inquest.
On that point, in the absence of hearing from me, the coroner is not prepared to conclude that I was actively excluded from carrying out my portfolio duties. He says:
There is no direct evidence to conclude that Mr Kaine was actively excluded from any involvement in the project. Why he did not become involved remains unanswered. I am not prepared to make a finding in either positive or negative terms ...
Mr Speaker, I did not attend, despite two letters from me to the coroner, after having heard that the Chief Minister and one of her staffers - then a senior public servant - had each tramped through that court and said that I was responsible, seeking to appear. For reasons that I am not clear on, he did not seek to have me give evidence. To say after the event, "I cannot come to any conclusions because Mr Kaine did not appear", is a very strange conclusion. That is the reason why I am choosing to say it now, Mr Speaker. I was denied the opportunity to defend myself against untrue and malicious allegations made against me during the coronial inquest into the Katie Bender death, and I am taking this opportunity today to get the facts on the record.
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