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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 14 Hansard (12 December) . . Page.. 4449 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

It is important to recognise some of the dates in relation to that. The legal opinion was sought in mid-April, I believe, as a result of a request from Treasury to the department of housing which was lodged in March, I understand. Some of these time lines are very interesting.

MR DEPUTY SPEAKER: I will take it that you sought and obtained leave to make a statement.

Council of Australian Governments meeting-6 December 2002

Ministerial statement

MR STANHOPE (Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Minister for Health, Minister for Community Affairs and Minister for Women): I ask for leave of the Assembly to make a ministerial statement concerning the Council of Australian Governments meeting of 6 December 2002.

Leave granted.

MR STANHOPE: I seek leave to have the statement incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The statement read as follows:

CHIEF MINISTER'S STATEMENT TO THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

OUTCOME OF COUNCIL OF AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENTS' MEETING, 6 DECEMBER 2002

Mr Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to provide feedback to Members on the outcome of the Council of Australian Governments' COAG meeting, which was held last Friday in Canberra.

The COAG meeting was attended by the Prime Minister, all Premiers and Chief Ministers and the President of the Local Government Association.

Agreement was reached between participants at the meeting on a number of key issues. These included counter-terrorism initiatives, handgun controls, insurance issues, water property rights, child protection, mutual recognition arrangements and formal intergovernmental agreements in a number of areas.

Mr Speaker, in relation to counter terrorism, COAG considered a report from the National Counter-Terrorism Committee (NCTC) that provided an overview of the current security environment and canvassed a number of measures to enhance national counter-terrorism arrangements.

I was pleased to be able to join with the other leaders to support a nationally coordinated approach to counter-terrorism. It was agreed that Australia could not afford to be complacent in relation to terrorist precautions.

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