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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 14 Hansard (10 December) . . Page.. 5149 ..

MRS CROSS (continuing):

government did or didn't do about Hicks, Guantanamo Bay and the children behind barbed wire fences-I remind the minister that detention centres were started by the Labor government, so don't you bloody go throwing stones at me in this place- irrespective of our personal feelings, as legislators we should not-Ms Tucker thinks it is funny. Of course she would.

Ms Tucker: I am just laughing at your language. It is all right.

MRS CROSS: Good. What has happened to the patriotism of Australians? What has happened to us being a united community, irrespective of our political beliefs? Why do we use political point-scoring and potential vote-scoring as a basis for dividing the community instead of bringing them together, particularly in a year, as Mrs Burke said, that has been extremely challenging for the Canberra community? Why can't people of your vintage do the right thing? You are a traditionalist.

Mr Wood: You bagged this Assembly this week. You bagged us unmercifully this week. Don't talk about not dividing, for heaven's sake. You slagged off at everybody in this place.

MRS CROSS: Quite rightly. Twenty million Australians do not all think the way this government thinks on Australia Day. Some will go off to a flag-raising event and some won't. We celebrate our national days in a variety of ways. Most countries that I have lived in have a great respect and a high regard for the way they celebrate their national day. They use it as a basis to look back on their history-the good, the bad and the ugly. They use it as a basis from which to learn to move forward. They never say that they have had a perfect history. We have all learnt from our history.

Saying sorry is important. Someone said earlier that the government should say sorry. Maybe someone should say sorry. At the end of the day let us not use that fundamental approach to things. We are dealing with some zealots here, fundamentalists that only see things in black or white. Let us not use that fundamentalist attitude to divide this community at a time when we need to be closer together, at a time when our security is an important issue. Will anyone quibble that security is an issue? No. It is an important issue.

Why are we using Australia Day as a basis to divide this community? We have an election year next year. The best thing that I as a leader could do, and the Chief Minister and his government should do, is bring everybody together, irrespective of personal beliefs about the Australia Day committee, whom they vote for and whom they belong to. That is irrelevant. At the end of the day I want to see the people of the ACT brought together by all legislators rather than it being used for political point-scoring on minority issues.

What does Australia Day mean? I was disappointed to read the Hansard. I thought to myself that we must not reflect on the selfish agendas of individuals. We must not as legislators use such a special day for political point-scoring. Zealots on either side of politics are dangerous. I have said that in this place on a couple of occasions.

I am very concerned that, instead of looking to do what is good for the majority of the Australian community and the Canberra community, we have self-interested people who

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