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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 7 Hansard (29 June) . . Page.. 2243 ..

MS CARNELL: Mr Speaker, I make the point clear again: I am very happy with Mr Harris' report. It achieved the outcomes that I wanted. Also, I am very pleased with the verbal briefings that he has given and the input that he has already had to some very important announcements that I will be making on the future of electronic service delivery of government in the very near future.

MR KAINE: I note the Chief Minister's continued defence of this document. It follows from the fact that she said also on Tuesday, "Whether my staffer's report is appropriate or lives up to my expectations"-her expectations-"surely, Mr Speaker, is a decision for me."

Ms Carnell: Yes.

MR KAINE: Yes. But it says something about the Chief Minister's standards, does it not? Mr Speaker, as a supplementary question to the Chief Minister, I ask: if I table a copy of Senator Lundy's report, which I doubt that the Chief Minister has taken the trouble to read, will she take it as a sample of a high-quality overseas travel report that she might refer to her staffers in future as a model when they put in their reports to justify the expenditure of considerable amounts of public money? I seek leave to table the report for the Chief Minister's education, Mr Speaker.

MS CARNELL: Kate Lundy and I have had many discussions on this issue because it is something in which we are both very interested. I am more than happy to look at Kate's report. In fact, I regularly look at her website because it is a very good one, I would have to say. It is one of the best parliamentary websites in Australia. I think a couple are better, but it is really in the top few. I am sure that we all spend a lot of time making sure that we keep up to speed on these things.

Mr Speaker, I come back to the view here that Mr Harris is a very competent staff member. His input to government and to policy development in this area has been exemplary. I make the point for Mr Kaine's benefit that I think that attacking staff members in this place is terribly inappropriate.

Mr Kaine: I'm attacking you, Chief Minister. It's your standards that I'm attacking.

MS CARNELL: I am very happy for you to attack me, but I think that it is unacceptable to attack staff members in this place. I believe very strongly, as do other members of the government, that our staff are part of the team. They are not lackeys who just do the work and we get on with the trips. They are very much part of the team. Their input to policy and other sorts of areas is incredibly important to our government. I know that all of our staff have played that role.

Mr Harris is certainly not the only staff member who has travelled overseas or travelled interstate on behalf of the government. My chief of staff regularly goes to conferences round Australia on financial reform and outputs-based budgeting. In fact, he regularly speaks at those conferences because he is regarded as one of the leading experts in that area. Mr Speaker, I am proud of my staff, very proud of my staff. They would not be

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