Page 4489 - Week 14 - Wednesday, 23 November 2005
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Chief Minister, it is fun to have a go at the Howard government. There is no doubt that the intellectual left enjoys nothing better than to give the Howard government, in particular, a kick. We have seen that in various forums. The Chief Minister would like to see himself as part of that intellectual left.
It is unfortunate, though, that, when leaders of our political parties and leaders of governments desire to give the Howard government a kick—and it is a free society; if people want to attack the government they are quite entitled to do that—they do so at the expense of civil relations with other governments, in particular the federal government. There is no more important relationship for the ACT government than the relationship with the federal government.
It is unfortunate when that desire to appease the Howard haters and have a go at the Howard government for whatever they might do is put before the genuine needs of the people of the ACT and put before a genuine seeking of good outcomes for the people of the ACT. The question then becomes: what does this kind of grandstanding do for the people of the territory? I suggest that it does not do very much at all.
I want to go through some of the examples. As I said, I had not expected 15 minutes, but we will see how we go. Mr Mulcahy mentioned Simon Corbell railing against the airport constantly. At the heart of that is the fact that the planning system that the airport is subject to does not appear to be anywhere near as cumbersome as the planning system that Mr Corbell presides over. Of course that is a sore point for Mr Corbell. In his attack on one of the commonwealth government agencies moving to the airport, he said, “This will hurt Civic,” when it emerged that there were no jobs moving out of Civic; it was extra jobs going to the airport. Never let the facts get in the way of a good rant.
In this place last week we had a bipartisan motion, supported by all 17 members, condemning the death penalty. It was condemned by all members. It should have been something that was bipartisan, where we could have said, “The whole Assembly supports this motion; the whole Assembly abhors the death penalty.”
Mr Stanhope: We do not get involved in those. We don’t sign international petitions.
MR SESELJA: The Chief Minister interjects and, as usual, he has not checked his facts. In fact, the motion said that the ACT Assembly abhors the death penalty. I do not think that is an international issue; that is an issue here. The ACT Assembly is saying that we abhor the death penalty. Once again, the Chief Minister has not checked his facts in his interjections. Maybe you can interject more with some ill-advised remarks and I can try to respond. That was about abhorrence of the death penalty.
What did the Chief Minister do? They had a stunt of a press conference. He tried to turn it into a partisan stunt, attacking the Howard government, somehow seeking to blame the Howard government for the situation that Van Nguyen finds himself in. I signed the petition. The situation is tragic. I oppose the death penalty. The Chief Minister, instead of embracing what was a bipartisan position in the Assembly, sought to turn it into an attack on the Howard government. That is another example of where, instead of having reasoned debate, we see this undergraduate stunt.
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