Page 2431 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 22 August 2006
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addressed. One that comes to mind is the paucity of the DOA, which Mr Stefaniak and Mr Mulcahy have spoken of.
With the best will in the world, it does not go the distance, it has to be always supplemented by other means. All the scrimping and saving in the world does not mean I can communicate with my electors in Ginninderra which, again, even though it is smaller than Molonglo, is by state and territory standards an enormous electorate. I do not represent one-fifth of the people in that electorate. I represent every one of them.
I cannot say to the second, third, fourth and fifth person who comes through my door or rings my phone, “No. I have already dealt with one person today. I will deal with the sixth person that comes through.” I have to deal with everyone who comes through that door, everyone who does me the courtesy of saying, “I think Vicki Dunne can help me with this problem.” I have to deal with them. That is my job, that is what they pay me for. They do not pay me to do it for one-fifth of the people.
The resources and quality of the technology available to us do not compare with that of members not just on the hill in the federal parliament but also with members in state parliaments who have smaller electorates in terms of geography and population. If you want anything even slightly out of the ordinary the response is, “Yes, you can have that, Mrs Dunne, so long as you pay for it out of your already overcommitted DOA.” If I want to produce PDF documents to put on a web page, I have to pay for that out of my DOA. These are the problems here.
Another problem I would like to touch on, which I raised in the estimates hearings and have raised in other places, is the difficulty members have in engaging contractors for short-term contracts. The constraints put upon members in this place and their capacity to employ people except on a wage and salary basis are entirely unreasonable. The constraints put upon potential contractors by the requirements of the Chief Minister’s directives and the Treasurer’s directives in relation to professional indemnity insurance and public liability insurance are onerous and almost verge on a breach of privilege, in that on many occasions it becomes impossible for people to employ people on a contract basis.
I have had the experience of attempting to employ someone to write speeches on an ad hoc basis. When you read the contract it says that the member owns the copyright of every speech or anything that is written by a contractor. I own the copyright. But that person, according to the determinations, has to have professional indemnity insurance in case that person writes a speech, I give the speech and it says something defamatory. Because of the arcane arrangements about insurance in the territory, the territory wants to have the potential to go and fang someone if I am sued for defamation, so long as someone is there who is fangable.
That means that if I want to employ somebody for a six-week period to write a couple of speeches and an article on a particular subject, that person has to go out and get one year’s worth of professional indemnity and public liability insurance, which they would not use in any other part of their business.
Professional writers and editors do not need public liability—professional indemnity insurance—anywhere else except when they are employed by a member of the ACT
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