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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 12 Hansard (5 December) . . Page.. 3654 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

example, of the Waldorf development, Mr Speaker, the Waldorf was entitled absolutely - not on the basis of a government discretion - to receive the benefits which the government provided to them because they satisfied objectively the criteria for receiving money, assistance, under the Civic revitalisation program. If it had been, for argument's sake, the Canberra Labor Club which had been conducting that development, it equally would have been entitled to that contribution from the government, to exactly the same tune, Mr Speaker, so there can be no question of the government making a gift to the Waldorf in order to be able to extract some promise from them later on, because anybody in that position of developing an inner city building would be in the position of being able to receive that benefit.

Clubs, however, are in a different position. They have a privilege which nobody else in this community enjoys. They have the privilege of receiving revenue from poker machines. To ask them, across the board, to return just 5 per cent of the profit from that to the community is simply not too much to ask.

Mr Speaker, the Labor Party says it supports our legislation now. After attacking it for some time they tell us that they now support the legislation, but as it turns out, looking at the amendments which Mr Quinlan has foreshadowed, they intend to rip the guts out of the legislation. That sounds like the sort of support I could well do without.

To answer a concern raised by Mr Rugendyke in this debate, yes, the government will ensure that any stamp duty payable to the ACT as a result of the requirements to incorporate is not a cost which needs to be borne by the clubs - that is, the government will ensure that that money is either waived or refunded to them - and we will do our best to ensure that any payments resulting from transfers of properties and the like interstate are waived by reciprocal arrangement with those particular states, as, I am advised, is usually the case.

Mr Speaker, I want to table the guidelines which have been referred to in this debate. I table the following paper:

The guidelines make it clear that the government intends to ensure that appropriate activities by clubs in the community are protected on an ongoing basis under this new legislation. I have had discussions with the clubs about these sorts of guidelines, although not as extensive discussions as I would like, Mr Speaker, but I believe that further discussion can occur before those guidelines are made. I indicate that the government will support one particular amendment to be moved by Mr Quinlan to ensure that the government does make those guidelines in future rather than leaving it as an open question. We will support that amendment that the Labor Party is going to move.

Let me reaffirm, Mr Speaker, that we believe it is important that the question of this privilege to use the revenue from poker machines be addressed by the Assembly at this time. There is a great deal of money which is appropriately in the hands of the community, and I believe this legislation will put it there. I have no doubt that many clubs are being extremely generous at the present time and are pulling their weight in terms of what the government has put forward in an absolutely exemplary way, and

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