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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 12 Hansard (7 December) . . Page.. 3880 ..

MS TUCKER: I did listen, and you said that you thought Mr Moore had responded to the concerns by saying the he would work on rewriting the response, which he should do because it is misleading and it is ridiculous. It says that the government agrees in principle, which is absolute lie. They do not agree in principle. They say straightaway that what they are doing is what they always said that they would do. It is just ridiculous, but we have already had that discussion.

Mr Rugendyke has now made it quite clear - I have had the feeling for some time anyway - that he thinks that his role here basically is to let the government do what it wants to do because the electorate will make a decision on it at the end of its term. It is fine if that is his position. I am just glad that it is out there in the public. Some of us who sit on the crossbench think we are here to scrutinise what the government is doing and actually represent the view of the people who have voted us in here and who may not agree with what government does. If they really agree with what government does all the time, why did they vote for us? (Extension of time granted.)

In summary, I have to make it quite clear in my response that basically Mr Moore's amendment is saying that the government want to proceed as they always have. They will rewrite the response in some way. There might be some little alterations around the fringes, but fundamentally what they are doing is changing the approach that the ACT has taken to public housing. They are removing security of tenure for people and do not understand the implications for those people of that action. Also, we have not seen the work done which the committee required.

I am also interested in the technical issues here. I was interested in the part of the Welfare Rights and Legal Centre's media release which said:

I would like clarification of that from Mr Moore. I think he should, at the least, do that for this place and explain exactly the mechanism for this. Is it the draft amendment to the housing assistance program that we saw 18 months ago? I would like to know that. I am interested in whether that is going to be pursued. Clause 11(1) of it says that the commissioner may periodically review whether a tenant remains eligible for and should be allocated continued assistance, having regard to the criteria set out in the subclauses listed. The language used here is "periodically review". It is not saying every three to five years. I want to understand and I think this house wants to understand, what that actually means. I want to understand exactly when the reviewing of people is going to start.

Does this mean that the six - month reviews for so - called bad tenants are going to occur in six months? What does "periodically" mean? I believe we need to have a clear explanation of that from the minister. I am also interested in that aspect of the bad tenants issue, too. The government's submission said that these people would be reviewed every six months, which would be extremely stressful for them and would not necessarily assist them to move out of what can sometimes be quite chaotic situations.

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