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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 2 Hansard (1 March) . . Page.. 402 ..

MR HUMPHRIES: Not as I read the committee's report. I read the committee as saying that a fee of $200 would be appropriate.

Mr Berry: No, have another read.

MR HUMPHRIES: I will, Mr Berry. But the point is that, whether it is $200 or $100, we are not going to be able to see fees of that order unless the community seeks to subsidise the regime of registration of the employment agents of this city. I have to say to the Assembly that, as Treasurer, I do not propose to bring forward a final budget in May that provides for the taxpayer to subsidise the registration of employment agents when no community benefit has been demonstrated in respect of these matters and the result would be a system which most employment agents in this town oppose.

Mr Berry: No, they do not.

MR HUMPHRIES: I am sorry, Mr Berry: I am happy to table the correspondence I have received from employment agents in this city which is almost universally opposed to your legislation.

Mr Berry: Not to me. Not to the committee.

MR HUMPHRIES: We have a dispute here between Mr Berry and me as to whether agents support this proposal. I will table my responses in writing from the employment agents showing what those views were and I invite Mr Berry to table the responses he has on the legislation as well.

Mr Berry: Sure. I have had 10.

MR HUMPHRIES: Can you put them on the table today?

Mr Berry: I do not see the relevance of doing that.

MR SPEAKER: Order! I do not want dialogue across the chamber.

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Berry, strangely, finds it irrelevant. In a debate about the Agents (Amendment) Bill where we are talking about the impact on agents in this town of legislation Mr Berry has brought forward he does not think it is relevant to table the correspondence he has had on this Bill. Mr Speaker, I want to quote a few bits and pieces from letters I have had from agents on these matters. I have had a letter from the Recruitment and Consulting Services Association, RCSA.

Mr Berry: Everybody has had that one.

MR HUMPHRIES: That is fine. They say in this letter:

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