Page 1203 - Week 04 - Thursday, 4 May 2006
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The hypocrisy of the Stanhope government is apparent. The fact is that they have now proved that Mr Stanhope cannot be believed when he says that people have nothing to fear from majority government. What we actually have here is the flexing of muscles. It is being the bully, saying, “We have got the numbers in the playground. We have got the capacity to take all the jacks ourselves.” That is what is actually happening. It is actually a gross, base grab for cash for the disaffected backbench members who did not get a place in the ministry. We have a pseudo select committee so that Mr Gentleman can get a chair’s allowance and somebody else will get a chair’s allowance out of this so that everyone can have their share of the jacks and this government can take hold of them itself. This playground has just become a no-go area unless you belong to the Labor team.
Mr Barr: Just because your colleagues took all that money off you.
MRS DUNNE: It is nice to have friends in the playground, Mr Barr, but the Labor bullies that you have just joined have just taken over the playground, to the detriment of good government in this place. It is really interesting to find that suddenly the iconoclasts of the left of the Labor Party are looking for precedent. They are scrabbling around for an opportunity to justify their bullying. This is a complete travesty. If you are going to look for precedents about how to perform in this Assembly, you should look at what has happened in this Assembly before you go somewhere else. There is no point in looking at House of Representatives Practice if there is already a practice in place here, and the practice in this place—
Mr Hargreaves: Like the Osborne Liberal government way of doing it.
MRS DUNNE: You might find, Mr Hargreaves, that last year we reported to this place that we had passed a motion in our party room that said that if we were in government we would never treat the committee system the way that it was treated last year and will be treated this year.
I will go to my records, find the motion and read it out later in the day in the adjournment debate. That is the approach that this opposition took. We had a discussion about it and we decided that it was not appropriate to exercise your muscle just because you had a majority. We would not do it. We have made a commitment. We made the commitment last year. I am happy to repeat that commitment this year. We would not do what this bullying Labor government is proposing to do today.
DR FOSKEY (Molonglo) (12.23): I seek leave to move the amendment circulated in my name.
Leave granted.
DR FOSKEY: I move the following amendment to Mr Corbell’s proposed amendment:
Omit all words after “Committee”, substitute “will have co-chairs, one held by the Government as decided by the Assembly, the other to be chosen by the Committee.”
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