Page 1257 - Week 05 - Thursday, 31 May 2007
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happened, and I gave him the opportunity to respond. Only this morning, my office received a response from Mr Barr, signed yesterday, in response to my letter of 7 May. While it does not address the issue of whether or not police were called—because I did not specifically raise it; it had been raised previously—knowing the way procedures work in offices, all of the attached correspondence would have been attached to that and the minister would have been reminded, once again when he signed this letter yesterday, that this matter had been raised with him.
I do not know why the minister said yesterday that he was not aware of any instances and that no instances had been brought to his attention where there had been a flagrant breach of the protocols and practice. This was a flagrant breach. This was an extraordinarily serious assault by one student upon another in a classroom—not in a playground—that should have been supervised and there were a considerable number of issues raised by the parents about the way that this matter was dealt with. They have been raised with the department directly and with the minister directly. I have raised those matters directly with the minister, and my senior staff member raised those matters directly as a matter of high priority when he first became aware of them, in my absence.
This is a matter that has been going on since 1 March and it is inconceivable that the minister did not know. It is possible that it may have slipped his memory yesterday during question time, under the pressure of answering questions, but it is inconceivable that he did not know, because there have been three instances that I know of where it has been brought to his attention—twice by my office, once by the parents concerned.
There has been a flagrant breach of the protocols. The minister’s job when this is brought to his attention is to come in here at the earliest possible time and to correct the record. My staff rang Mr Barr’s office this morning and reminded him of the correspondence and warned him that if he did not correct the record we would be taking further action. This minister has had every opportunity to correct the record. I know that he is the junior member of the Assembly and he has risen to great heights very quickly, but there is something called taking advice around the place. He has experience, having been a staff member in this place for some time, and he should know what the protocols are and how things stand.
The other day Mr Seselja came into this place immediately after question time when he realised that the words that he had used in question time were incorrect, and he corrected the record. I have done it on a number of occasions. It is a bit humbling when you have to stand up here and say, “I am really sorry, colleagues; I made a mistake.” But it is far better that we go through that slightly humbling experience of saying, “I am sorry, colleagues; I made a mistake,” and we all shrug our shoulders and say, “Thank you, minister”, or member, “for setting the record straight.” But this minister has had warning. I wrote to him yesterday afternoon. I ensured that my staff hand-delivered the letter to his office, pointed out to the person to whom it was delivered the importance of the letter and asked that it be brought immediately to the minister’s attention. I understand that the minister was in his office at the time that the letter was delivered.
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