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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 03 Hansard (Thursday, 11 March 2004) . . Page.. 1102 ..

perhaps a suspended sentence. I cannot recall the original sentence, but it related to smashing up his restaurant. It was a family restaurant, he and his wife were estranged, and it was because of his mental health problems. It is a particularly sad case. It was a young fellow I used to coach in the under 14s. He is now about 40 or so. He came to me with some accommodation problems and simple problems too like needing to transfer from whoever was assisting him with his problems at Woden to Civic because that is where he lived, and that seemed to take some time.

Whilst Mr Corbell’s staff was of great assistance, there were still some really basic problems in his being transferred from Woden to Civic. On one occasion he presented in my office almost suicidal and was assisted reasonably promptly there. It brought home to me some of the very real problems in this area and the need for us to improve our systems to deal with people with these problems. I have not heard back from him. I will not say his name in this debate, but I will get in contact with Mr Corbell’s office because I hope he is all right. The last time I saw him he had some significant problems and was a real danger to himself. He was suffering from utter depression as a result of his needs not being attended to. I certainly hope he is now being assisted by someone in the Civic region, which is where he lives, rather than at Woden. There are many issues. More recently, another lady who, from what her carer and friend tells me is quite normal, can hold down jobs and can study a part-time degree, but has some medication that—

MR SPEAKER: The time allotted for this debate has expired.

Select Committee—Estimates

Membership

MR SPEAKER: I have been notified in writing of the nomination of Mrs Cross, Ms MacDonald, and Mr Smyth to be members of the Select Committee on Estimates 2003-2004 (No 3).

Motion (by Mr Wood, by leave) agreed to:

That the Members so nominated be appointed as members of the Select Committee on Estimates 2003-2004 (No 3).

Electoral Act—Subordinate law SL 2004-6

Disallowance

Debate resumed.

MS DUNDAS (4.40): Before lunch I was talking about the coat of arms and what the coat of arms looks like. The coat of arms has been the official symbol of Canberra since 1928. Maybe the government does not like the coat of arms, maybe it does not fit with the government’s design corporate image. Maybe it wishes to distinguish the Labor government from the former Liberal government that used the coat of arms, as did all governments before it. Regardless of the reason, this is not the way to change the official symbols of Canberra, not by some underhanded change through electoral regulation that the government hoped nobody would notice. We should not be putting a marketing slogan into the legislation so that the government of the day can brand itself in this way.

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