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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 7 Hansard (27 June) . . Page.. 2036 ..

MR KAINE (continuing):

The Chief Minister has put the committee in an odd situation, I believe, because we could have tabled them as attachments to our report. We did not do so because in the last discussion we had it was agreed that the government should table them. I find it rather odd that in the short time since then the probity auditor has totally changed his mind as compared to what he told us, and that the chief executive officer of ACTEW, with whom we have been acting in good faith for some time now, seems to have changed his view on what course of action should be taken to inform this place on what is happening.

We agreed with those two people that there are a couple of issues in the status report that could have commercial-in-confidence applications, and we agreed that if necessary they should be excised before the document was tabled here. So I am at a loss to understand why, having reached that agreement, the committee does not attach them to the report because the government will do so, we understood, and now we are told the government is not going to do so.

I think we need something more from the Chief Minister as an explanation as to why that tacit agreement, at least, with the committee has been set aside. It means that the members of this place are not as fully informed on the status of the proceedings as they would have been, particularly had the status report been tabled. I cannot, for the life of me, understand why the probity auditor would not want his interim report tabled because, essentially, all it says is that he finds no problem with the process up until this time. So why would he not want that tabled? Why would the Chief Minister not want it tabled? I just do not understand what the reasoning and the logic are.

I suspect it is just another aspect of the secrecy with which this government chooses to do everything: "Don't put anything on the table; don't tell anybody anything until you are absolutely compelled to do so." I must say that, given the openness of the discussions between the committee and the officers involved in this process up until now, it is very disappointing to get to this point and to discover that somebody now thinks that we, collectively, should not tell the members of this place everything that is going on when there is nothing there of any great disputation. It is nothing more than a status report of how well the process has been going, and the Assembly is not going to be fully informed. I repeat, I am gravely disappointed.

MR QUINLAN (5.11), in reply: I will not take long, Mr Speaker. I did say at the outset of our report that this was the most significant financial transaction or decision since self-government. It concerns me greatly that the Chief Minister, as a shareholder of ACTEW, can distance herself and say, "I will let the board decide what will happen with hundreds of millions of dollars."

I think we have a genuine matter of materiality here in the amount of money that we are talking of. We are talking of something in the order of $400 million in assets and probably $200 million is property which belongs to the territory. I know that a board of an instrumentality like ACTEW-ACTEW will be the holding company-will discuss the future of those sorts of funds with government. I would be astounded if, at a future time, the question of a capital restructure of ACTEW or the joint venture arose and the board members of ACTEW did not discuss it with the shareholders or with the government, who just happen to be the same parties. I would be absolutely astounded.

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