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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 7 Hansard (21 June) . . Page.. 2408 ..

Question so resolved in the affirmative.

Adjournment

That the Assembly do now adjourn.

Mr Pat Torpy-Retirement

MR SPEAKER: Members, today marks the last day that one our attendants, Mr Pat Torpy, will undertake duty in the chamber. Pat will leave us next week, having been a member of the Secretariat staff since June 1995-you must be a masochist, Pat-following a distinguished career in the public service. Pat will be missed, I am sure, by all of us. On behalf of all members, I wish him well for the future and thank him for his friendly and efficient service during his time here.

Members: Hear, hear!

Canberra National Multicultural Festival

MR WOOD (9.57): Good fishing, Pat!

Let me talk about some more of the government nonsense that we have witnessed in recent times, not just tonight. I was interested earlier today to get a media release under the name of Brendan Smyth, MLA, with the title "A successful 2001 National Multicultural Festival". It would appear that Mr Smyth is pleased with the success, he claims, of the Canberra National Multicultural Festival. I am not going to argue about that. I am pleased to see him offering those congratulations. As we know, the program for the multicultural festival was unquestionably the program drawn up by Domenic Mico, who was the artistic director of the festival. Therefore, Mr Smyth's congratulations and praise sit oddly with his earlier actions when he stood by and allowed some considerable injustice to occur when Mr Mico was sacked. They were very strange indeed.

Mr Moore: You wanted him to interfere, did you?

MR WOOD: He stood by, did nothing and allowed it all to happen. For Mr Smyth to come out today and congratulate the festival seems strange indeed. Maybe Mr Humphries should add his thanks. Mr Mico was sacked specifically because he said that the festival needed to be separated from CTEC. That got him the sack, but Mr Humphries and the government took Mr Mico's advice. What did they do? They separated the festival from CTEC. They separated the two bodies, just as Mr Mico had said should happen. Effectively, the government has said, "Mr Mico, you were right." Maybe Mr Humphries should thank Mr Mico for the good advice that he gave. That seems a better way to go than to endorse the sacking that occurred.

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