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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 14 Hansard (10 December) . . Page.. 5160 ..

MR SMYTH: No, we will come to emotional claptrap later. Then he says that it is a photocopy of the NCA. That is just the point. It isn't. It is not a photocopy. The NCA is not running a great Aussie breakfast. Citizenship ceremony: well, maybe they are. Flag-raising ceremony-NCA is not running that. Picnic in the park-NCA is not running that. Fireworks-NCA is not running that. It is not a photocopy. I can send you a copy of the submission if you want.

Mr Hargreaves says that he is sick and tired of the feds. What did he call them? He called them camp followers. Is "camp followers"parliamentary, Mr Speaker? Perhaps you would give us a ruling on camp following. He talked about rank failure. And then he said that this was "sending a message to these sorts of people". He referred to "these sorts of people". Who are these sorts of people?

If you look at the list, there is an MLA who happens to be a patron. There is an OAM, there is an AM, there is an AC, there is an OAM, there is an AC, there is an AO, there is a CVO, there is an AC, a DSO, an AFC, there is a KCVO, an AO and an AOM. Leading Australians are now categorised by Mr Hargreaves as "these sorts of people".

If you want to send a message to people about getting involved in their community, bring John Hargreaves out. He will get them fired up. John Hargreaves wants these sorts of people sent a message that we do not want them here. How dare you have the gall to form a group to do something nice for your community and ask the government for a bit of help.

Mr Hargreaves says that the government will be telling us who they can be. That is the message to the central government for Mr Hargreaves. Then he said the feds have told us what we can do. Well, the feds have not told us what we can do. They are organising their own function on the other side of the lake. You have got no idea. Who has told us what we can do? The ACT government has told them what they can and cannot do.

Ms Tucker has made some comments relating to what was said by the federal minister. Okay, if we have got it wrong, what is the alternative? What would she do? How would she celebrate Australia Day? Where is the debate brought on by the Greens about what Australia Day should mean?

She raises the issue of the National Museum. Who built it? After 20 years of argument, including 13 years of Labor government when Bob McMullan regularly trotted out the promise to build a national museum somewhere, sometime, some place in Australia, we actually built it. We put the money there. We built it.

We built the museum that is generating the debate. Isn't it a good idea that we might have some debate about our identity? The museum is there because the federal Liberal government put it there, after 13 years of failure of the Labor government who could not, would not and did not deliver it. If we are having a debate about the Australian identity because of it. That is a good thing. We should constantly have a debate and a re-assessment of what it is that we understand ourselves to be.

Mr Speaker, the beautiful thing about Australia is that we can celebrate so many festivals and everybody joins in, whether it is Dewali, Ramadan, Chinese New Year or-God forbid-Christmas and Australia Day. They are different days and we embrace them all

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