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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 4 Hansard (28 March) . . Page.. 953 ..

MR WOOD: I ask a supplementary question. I thank the Chief Minister for that. She might have cleared up some of the confusion and angst. If the Minister can tell me what has happened to the surplus Bruce Stadium seats, where they have gone and at what price, I would be very happy.

MR STEFANIAK: Off the top of my head, Mr Wood, I do not know exactly where they have all gone, but I could certainly get that information for you. They have gone to a number of places and been utilised in a number of sporting venues.

Mr Wood: You will come back to me, will you?

MR STEFANIAK: I will give you some details as to where exactly they have gone.

MS TUCKER: My question, directed to the Chief Minister, relates to her announcement that the Government will assist Impulse Airlines to establish an operations base in Canberra. Chief Minister, the statement of intent with Impulse Airlines that you provided to members was signed on 22 March, last Wednesday, and presumably took some days to prepare. I also note that the study by Access Economics into the economic impacts of investment by Impulse Airlines was dated 24 March, which was last Friday, and was commissioned two weeks before. The report states that it was meant to provide an input into the Government's consideration of the level of support to be offered to the airline but, not surprisingly, the report notes that "little time was available for the analysis". It goes on to state:

Given that this report was finished after you had made your decision to provide assistance to Impulse and it is only a superficial report, how could it have formed any meaningful input into the Government's decision-making process, or was the report really meant to justify a decision that had already been made?

MR SPEAKER: Chief Minister, let that go - what you can of it.

MS CARNELL: No, that is simply not the case. As you would be aware, the document that was signed by me and Impulse Airlines last Wednesday is a non-binding document. It is a memorandum of understanding and agreement but is non-binding on the parties, because we indicated at the time that we were going to bring the issue to the Assembly in an open and accountable manner. The Access Economics statement, in its final form, is available and was distributed to members as soon as we got it. That was very appropriate.

Ms Tucker quoted one bit of the report. Access Economics goes on to make the point that they did not have a lot of time so they used very conservative assumptions in their report. They state:

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