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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 12 Hansard (24 November) . . Page.. 3617 ..

MR BERRY (continuing):

It was headed "Ecumenical service to mark the passing of a former hospital". It was a media release from Kate Carnell MLA, Australian Capital Territory Chief Minister, Treasurer and so on.

There are other public aspects that we all remember for ACT public servants- the email sent out to 48 ACT government agencies and officers which encouraged all Canberrans to come and say goodbye to these buildings which have played such a significant role in Canberra's health care. These same words were also contained in a government advertisement on page 5 of the Canberra Times, an invitation to all Canberrans.

The first response of the Chief Minister following the tragedy was: "It's not my fault; it's Totalcare's". Even during the last week she has still been saying, "It's Trevor Kaine's fault". This constant squirming is sickening. The first time I heard the Chief Minister say, "It's not my fault", I was sickened. I thought to myself, "Here it comes again, the same old line". I was not the only one who felt that way. We were reminded again this week of the Chief Minister's first appearance on television only hours after the tragedy seeking sympathy from the people of Canberra - sympathy not for the Bender family but for herself.

Mrs Carnell was seeking sympathy from the hundreds of thousands of people she had urged to attend the implosion for herself; sympathy from people deeply touched by the tragedy, sitting numbly watching the television coverage, thinking how close they were to death or serious injury, all in response to the personal beckoning of Kate Carnell, the Chief Minister. How betrayed they must have felt.

None of this would have happened if the implosion method was not the idea of government. It is plain that from the beginning this Government wanted to blow that building up. Every public servant in town with any authority knew that the Government was going to blow this building up from the word go. Good sense and good management had been corrupted with the political expediency requirements of the Chief Minister which have permeated the Public Service, especially at senior levels.

At the end of the day, there could have been no doubt in anyone's mind that this building was going to be demolished by explosives. That would have been fine if everything had gone according to plan, if the building had blown up, if it fell at its own footprint as people had promised, if it was as safe as the Chief Minister had repeatedly said over and over again it would be. Most importantly, had the demolition occurred when nobody was around, without the explosion of publicity that went with it, orchestrated by the Chief Minister's own office, 100,000 people would not have been drawn to the disaster where the subsequent death occurred and thousands were put in mortal danger.

It is part of the history of democracies that people gather together for their own protection and trust governments to provide for their welfare and safety. There has been a fundamental breach of faith by this Government towards its citizens in this regard because the Government has not lived up to its responsibility. This is why we have police forces, fire and ambulance services and agencies to protect the interests of the community. It is why we hold individuals responsible for their actions and why we

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