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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 06 Hansard (Wednesday, 23 June 2004) . . Page.. 2525 ..

this place—and Mr Corbell has far more experience in this chamber than I—I ask why it is that he is not doing what the people elected him to do, which is to genuinely represent their interests.

I would have thought that a petition with more than 35,000 signatures, which is still growing, reflects a significant voice of the community. Why is it that you would try to stop a petition being tabled which is a significant representation of the community—one could say a significant people-power voice? Why would you do that if you are genuinely interested in representing the interests of your community and the people who elected you to represent them? Really, that is why we are here. We are not here for our own personal agenda.

I heard earlier, during speeches made by Ms Dundas, Mrs Burke, Mrs Dunne, Mr Pratt and Mr Stefaniak, snide comments coming from the backbench of the government, very nasty comments, that this was politicking. For crikey’s sake, this is a political arena. We are all politicians. For the backbench of the government to criticise speeches supporting this bill, which aims to achieve good outcomes for the community and to look after small business, a primary health care provider and, above all, not allow small business to be swallowed up by big business—I do not get it. I think Mr Hargreaves’s comments earlier, which were not only uncalled for but also, frankly, tended to border on the flippant and silly, were unnecessary because we all want to do good things for the community here.

I will close the in-principle stage of this debate by thanking once again the members who are supporting this bill. In particular, I would like to thank Mr Smyth, the Leader of the Opposition, for working with me and Ms Dundas and Ms Tucker to try to achieve some outcome that we can hopefully realise by the end of the evening. I look forward to the debate in the detail stage.

Question resolved in the affirmative.

Bill agreed to in principle.

Detail stage

Clause 1.

Motion (by Mr Corbell) agreed to:

That the debate be adjourned.

Mrs Dunne: To a later hour this day.

MR SPEAKER: In the ordinary course of events here, when a motion to adjourn a particular matter is put, we resolve the matter of the adjournment first. I am required to subsequently set the resumption of the debate, whereupon members can move amendments, unless the resumption of the debate is dealt with in the original motion. In the case of Mr Corbell’s motion, the resumption of the debate was not dealt with. I am required to put it without debate. It is open to members to deal with the question that

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