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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 7 Hansard (20 June) . . Page.. 2169 ..
Mr Stanhope: How many of the cheques have been cashed?
MR HUMPHRIES: Does it matter, Mr Stanhope, how many have been presented? The fact is that if we simply refused to exercise call in power in respect of that matter those people who were creditors of that particular developer would have had no leverage-
Mr Corbell: And still are.
MR HUMPHRIES: No, some of them are not. Some of them are now no longer creditors, Mr Corbell.
Opposition members interjecting-
MR SPEAKER: Order! Mr Quinlan asked a question. He deserves an answer.
MR HUMPHRIES: I do not know what our guests in the gallery think of the interjections in these sorts of debates, Mr Speaker.
MR SPEAKER: They could not think anything worse than I do.
MR HUMPHRIES: I think they regard it as very rude.
Mr Moore: It is bad manners.
MR HUMPHRIES: Indeed, it is bad manners. The fact is that you asked a question and I want to give you an answer to it. The government has put in place a succession of changes arising out of the Auditor's report on the Bruce Stadium. Do not take my word for that. Look at what the Auditor has to say in the report handed down yesterday. He referred to those changes and he commended the direction that those changes have taken.
Mr Speaker, I made a major statement on this in February on public service renewal. That process is continuing, and it is a process which, I am pleased to say, is being recognised now by people such as the Auditor-General as a process which is necessary to provide for more rigorous standards of accountability and action in the public service. I think the processes we are putting in place will identify weaknesses in government contract making, which is precisely the sort of issue which Mr Quinlan was talking about. Although no government of any ilk can pretend that there are no problems with contracts from time to time, this process is more likely to produce a reduction in those sorts of problems.
MR QUINLAN: I have a supplementary question. In the area of public service renewal, as you called it, where the limelight has been taken from the government and placed on the administration-
MR SPEAKER: No preamble, please.
MR QUINLAN
: I was trying to remind him of which public service renewal we are talking about, Mr Speaker. Will that include advice to public servants that having entered a contract they do not have to do the work themselves to cover up for the shortfalls of
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