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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 3 Hansard (7 March) . . Page.. 648 ..
MR SPEAKER: He is getting very close to debating it, I grant you.
MR BERRY: I admit that I have been close on a couple of occasions, Mr Speaker. I now want to refer to the financial assessment of the joint venture proposal between ACTEW and AGL, which I understand has been tabled. Professor Hodgson - again, this is information that needs to be clarified - said:
My conclusion is that I am not able to make an assessment of the commercial viability of this proposal based upon the financial information provided in the above documents.
Mr Speaker, whom else do we need to tell us that there is inadequate information? How many times do we need experts to tell us that we are being kept in the dark? How many times do we have to experience the problems of being kept in the dark - Bruce Stadium, Canberra Hospital, the futsal slab - - -
MR SPEAKER: Careful now.
Mr Stanhope: What about the rock concert?
MR BERRY: The rock concert.
MR SPEAKER: You are running very close again.
MR BERRY: Mr Speaker, those are examples of where we have been kept in the dark before. We have learnt our lesson on this side of the house: Do not trust them. We need all the time in the world to get to the bottom of this. I am not even sure that we will get to the bottom of this by June.
Ms Carnell: Or this year. Or this century.
MR BERRY: I am not saddled with the ideology that you must sell public assets. I am interested in public assets being used to produce public benefit.
Mr Hird: It was a shame your Labor Government did not have the same attitude with Belconnen Mall.
MR BERRY: I heard that interjection. If you had been outside with your camera, you would have been able to take a picture of me because I was on the picket line. Where were you?
Mr Hird: Right there.
Mr Humphries: Where were you when Qantas was sold, Wayne, and Australian Airlines?
MR BERRY: I was wearing a T-shirt saying "I own an airline and a bank and they are not for sale".
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