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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 10 Hansard (23 September) . . Page.. 3537 ..

MRS BURKE: I have a supplementary question. Will the minister advise if he gave a directive to try and stop people from talking to me when they become increasingly disillusioned with the service they receive from you, Minister, or this government?

MR WOOD: Once again, Mrs Burke makes wild, sweeping statements with no foundation. My approach is as I have indicated. People anywhere, whether they are ACT Housing tenants or citizens of this territory, have the right to handle things as they wish. I have never given any directions, and you should know that I have never given any directions of the sort that you say.

Film, television and interactive entertainment industry

MR HARGREAVES: My question is to the Treasurer. Can the Treasurer inform the Assembly of the outcomes of the Film, Television and Interactive Entertainment Industry Development Forum, held on 2 September?

MR QUINLAN: Thank you, Mr Hargreaves. I certainly can.

Mr Stefaniak: Have you been given an acting contract?

Mrs Dunne: The old thespian!

MR SPEAKER: Order, members! The Treasurer has the floor. Order!

MR QUINLAN: Yes, certainly. I did notice over the weekend that the Liberal Party had a conference. I saw it on TV-I thought it was someone's lounge room, but it was actually in the Canberra Club-and noticed that the phrase the Liberals were going to concentrate on was "creative industries". Previous to that, Mr Smyth had put out a press release saying that he had invented the concept of film and television schools way back in November of last year.

I want to let the Assembly know the work the government has been doing over a considerable amount of time consulting with the industry and working towards the setting up of an office of film and television-or whatever the industry feels is appropriate. There is no point-unless you are in opposition, of course-in off-the-top- of-your-head stuff. No doubt, the opposition will be aware that we have headed that way.

We have had a very positive forum, attended by some 70 people. The forum brought forward some very constructive suggestions. In fact, the industry itself wanted to form its own reference and working group and go through the issues to make sure that everybody was happy with the next steps that were taken. Formed out of that will be a group representing the three major sectors within film, within television and within the interactive games/digital games sector. They will be working, as a reference group with government, towards setting up an office.

In the first place the office will be a relatively modest thing. It is not going to be a huge shopfront with a cinemascope screen for showing trailers. The industry has indicated that what they really need is a repository of intelligence.

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