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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 3 Hansard (9 March) . . Page.. 874 ..

MR TEMPORARY DEPUTY SPEAKER: There is no point of order. Resume your seat, and do not be smart, Mr Berry. It is not becoming.

Mr Berry: Well, stop yelling at me.

MR TEMPORARY DEPUTY SPEAKER: Do not be smart, Mr Berry. You will make history very soon, sir, if you keep it up.

MS CARNELL: As I said, those opposite have asked us for things like the value of the assets, the future profit, what the equalisation payment will be, as if any of those things would make any difference to their position. It would make no difference at all. If the equalisation payment was a billion dollars, it would not make any difference. So what is this about?

Mr Stanhope: It is not about running pop concerts, Chief Minister.

MR TEMPORARY DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The Leader of the Opposition will come to order. The Chief Minister has the call.

Mr Moore: Warn him. He has not been warned yet. Warn him.

MR TEMPORARY DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Moore, I know you are trying to help but you are not.

Mr Quinlan: We are talking damage minimisation now.

MR TEMPORARY DEPUTY SPEAKER: And that goes for you too, Mr Quinlan.

MS CARNELL: It is simply a stalling tactic from those opposite, as we have already heard from Mr Humphries. Mr Humphries quoted Mr Corbell suggesting that we had got it wrong last time because we had done all the work before we got approval. We are not asking for approval of the deal. This is a facilitation Bill. It allows the negotiations to go forward with confidence that a deal can be struck if it works for both parties. If the board of ACTEW and the board of AGL believe that there is a deal that can be done in the interests of both parties, then a deal can be struck. But this Bill does not approve the deal.

We have been asked whether, if we were a private sector board, we would be given the imprimatur to go ahead without the figures on the table. The answer is yes. Private sector boards would not enter into significant negotiations and significant expenditure unless they were confident that, if things panned out, they could do a deal. They would not do it on the off-chance that somebody would knock it off at the death knell.

Why do those opposite want to bring this back to this place for another vote? It is simply so they can oppose it again. That is all it is about. It really does not matter what the figures look like. They will continue to oppose and oppose and oppose. It is sensible for us to pass this legislation tonight to allow the ACTEW board and the AGL board to get on with the job of assessing whether a joint venture approach, under the

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